Roger Federer can probably play better, but it's hard to imagine how.
The 38-year-old Swiss beat Novak Djokovic for the first time in four years – and six FedEx ATP Head2Head meetings – on Thursday night, dazzling a capacity crowd at The O2 with a 6-4, 6-3 win against the World No. 2.
“Great atmosphere, a great opponent here in London at The O2, definitely incredibly special. Just a night I enjoyed from the beginning. I played incredible, and I knew I had to because that’s what Novak does and I was able to produce. So it was definitely magical,” Federer said.
The third-seeded Federer, making his 17th appearance, reached his 16th semi-final at the season-ending Nitto ATP Finals and ended Djokovic's season, along with his hopes of finishing year-end No. 1 in the ATP Rankings for a record-tying sixth time.
Djokovic needed to win the title to have a chance at knocking Rafael Nadal off the top spot, but now Nadal is guaranteed his fifth year-end No. 1 finish, evening him with Federer, Djokovic and American Jimmy Connors.
Federer finished second in Group Bjorn Borg, behind Austrian Dominic Thiem, who beat both Federer and Djokovic earlier this week. The Swiss will face the Group Andre Agassi winner on Saturday.
No matter who he faces, though, if the six-time champion plays like he did on Thursday evening, he'll be hard – if not impossible – to beat. Federer barely made a mistake against Djokovic, attacking the Serbian and serving flawlessly. He finished with 23 winners to only five unforced errors.
In the first set, Federer won 87 per cent (20/23) of his service points and made only one unforced error to start their 49th FedEx ATP Head2Head meeting. Djokovic had won their last meeting, saving two match points in the Wimbledon final, but the Serbian threw in a loose service game at 1-1. The World No. 2 donated two double faults to start, and on break point, 0/40, Federer walloped a sitting backhand.
“He was the better player in all aspects and absolutely deserved to win,” Djokovic said. “He served great, moved well, returned my serve very well... He did everything right.”
Djokovic, who led their head-to-head series 26-22, responded in the second set, saving two break points in the opening game to rip back momentum. The Serbian then saw his first break chance of the match in the fourth game, but couldn't convert and ran into more trouble on his serve at 2-2.
Djokovic, hearing chants of “Let's go, Roger, let's go!”, fell behind 15/40 and sailed a forehand long to give Federer the second break of the match. The Swiss, who lost the Wimbledon match points on his racquet, broke once more to close it out.
“There was a lot riding on the match. I think I served great, had great anticipation, a clear game plan and it worked to perfection tonight, and hopefully not the last time against Novak,” Federer said. “But even if it didn’t, it was all worth it. It was a great performance tonight from me.”
atptour.com
Ah revenge, how sweet it is.
I will admit I had my doubts about this one, based on the level Novak was at in his first 2 matches especially vs Thiem even though he lost it generally his level was much better than Roger.
Even after Roger won the first set, I was holding my breath because I knew the job was not done yet and Djokovic being Djokovic could still mount some miraculous comeback as soon as Roger slightly dropped his level on serve.
After all Roger won the first set at Wimbledon and we all know what happened there. As he himself said in his post match interview tonight in terms of what he did differently "I won the match point I guess".
We all know how much that loss still hurts, so this straight sets win was a real statement that had to feel good. First win over Novak Djokovic since 2015 ATP World Tour finals and it was an emphatic one.
And the manner in which he accomplished it must have felt even better. His serve was the best it's been all tournament, probably since winning Basel in October.
It put a lot of pressure on Djokovic, not giving him a chance to get into the match by playing long points the way he usually does.
Roger was playing on his terms and that was the real difference.
And yes I'm sure some will say that Djokovic was playing half-heartedly due to his previous match with Dominic Thiem taking a lot out of him physically or mentally, and there's some truth to that (he did grab his elbow in the beginning of the 2nd set).
Might have also been the pressure of trying to win for another shot at end of year world #1 spot, and maybe even the crowd getting to him a bit.
But whatever the factor, there's no denying that Roger is the one who was better tonight and he thoroughly deserved the win.
Looking forward to finding out who he plays next in the semis over the weekend.
And I'm going to re-watch this one because I was too stressed to truly enjoy it while watching it live.
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