Once he arrived here for the US Open, his winking wit seemed to return, and he said strangers wished him back to No. 1 from his newfound settlement at No. 2 behind Rafael Nadal. The 27-year-old man from one of the world’s most un-New York places — the staid Basel, Switzerland — repeatedly said he felt like a New Yorker.

So as the grand arc of Federer’s celestial tennis career resumed its upward track Monday evening, the Arthur Ashe Stadium DJ played Still The One, and Federer soon said puckishly, “It’s great, the guy putting on the music being my fan, right?”

He had summoned much of his vast repertoire and sapped the drama out of a US Open final and his 6-2, 7-5, 6-2 victory over first-time Grand Slam finalist Andy Murray of Scotland loosed a barrage of edits to the tennis record books.

It made Federer the first player with five consecutive US Open titles since Bill Tilden won six from 1920-25. It made Federer the first player to win five consecutive titles at two different Grand Slam tournaments because he won five straight Wimbledon titles between 2003 and 2007. It gave Federer 13 Grand Slam titles, halving his deficit behind Pete Sampras’s record 14. It gave Federer 34 straight wins in Flushing Meadows, 35 if you count a walkover in the fourth round of the 2004 tournament.

Perhaps most poignantly, though, it gave Federer one Grand Slam title in 2008 that might quickly climb his rankings of most cherished, and it made him a de facto New Yorker.

“It’s incredible the amount of people here in New York that just come up to me and recognise me now and sort of wish me luck, cab drivers screaming out I’m still the guy, and, ‘You can do it.’ It’s great, you know. “I think the French Open loss was brutal, but I got over that one pretty easily, played great on the grass, and had a really tough loss at Wimbledon which, you know, I was proud to be part of such a great match, but at the same time, you know, it just sort of made me sad, you know, not having won that great epic match. Maybe I was always dreaming about it and not winning it, you know.

‘Always positive’

“I was always positive, you know.”

All along, as he lost 12 different matches to nine different players and struggled in the hardcourt season, losing an Olympic quarter-final to James Blake, he dealt with the world’s acknowledgement of his fresh imperfections while winning only two titles before the US Open.

The US Open cured that, even if he still doesn’t feel he’s moving as he once did.

After a frenetic final point on which Federer, 27, menaced at the net and Murray, 21, scampered around using his uncommon court coverage, Federer finally hit an overhead that Murray couldn’t quite squeeze back. He then sank to his knees and rolled around on the New York concrete.

“This is a very special moment in my career,” he said immediately afterward.

His slightly muddled year ended with one heck of a New York garnish.