The 37-year-old has now reached the semi-finals at his hometown tournament in 12 consecutive appearances. The Swiss is 15-1 in Basel quarter-finals, with his only loss at this stage of the event coming 19 years ago against then-World No. 6 Tim Henman. Federer was just 18 years old.
The eight-time champion and 13-time finalist has now won 18 consecutive matches at the ATP World Tour 500-level event, where he is pursuing his 99th career tour-level trophy. If Federer goes on to triumph this week, he’ll earn his fourth title of the season, finishing in the winners’ circle that many times in a year for the 14th time.
And while Federer got through after two hours and 34 minutes, it was anything but easy for the Swiss.
Simon has shown good form this year, winning titles in Pune and Metz. And the Frenchman showed it against Federer, keeping the home favourite from gaining any rhythm, especially off his dangerous forehand side. Simon served for the opening set, and then held a set point on the eight-time champion's serve while leading 6-5. But Federer, who made a slew of unforced errors off the forehand wing early, reduced his mistakes to cruise through the ensuing tie-break.
But the Frenchman maintained his focus, mixing up his paces well in the second set to continue frustrating the Swiss, forcing a decider. But despite coughing up an early break in the third set, Federer stayed the course and advanced, despite getting broken five times, when Simon missed a two-handed backhand long. Federer has now won seven consecutive FedEx ATP Head2Head matches against Simon, leading their rivalry 7-2.
Federer will face the winner of #NextGenATP Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas and Russian Daniil Medvedev, who has captured three ATP World Tour titles this season. While Federer has not played Tsitsipas, he defeated Medvedev in their first FedEx ATP Head2Head meeting at the recent Rolex Shanghai Masters.
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