For the second straight year at the World Tour Finals, an all-Swiss semifinal between Roger Federer and Stan Wawrinka will take place. The 2014 installment did not disappoint, as Federer outlasted his countryman in a third-set tiebreaker at the end of a heated, controversial battle.
Roger Federer and Stan Wawrinka will be facing each other for the 21st time in their careers when they battle for a place in the World Tour Finals title match on Saturday night.
Federer is dominating the head-to-head series 17-3, but what was once the most lopsided and least interesting “rivalries” in all of tennis has reinvented itself over the last 17 months. Wawrinka has won two of their last six meetings–in the 2014 Monte-Carlo final and in the quarters of the French Open this spring.
Their showdown at the same stage of this same event last year will not soon be forgotten. Federer saved five match points before prevailing 4-6, 7-5, 7-6(6), and even the incredibly close scoreline hardly tells the full story. The night featured an alleged on-court shouting match between Wawrinka and Federer’s wife followed by a reported lock-room confrontation between the two players.
Bad blood seems to be a thing of the past for the two Swiss stars, who teamed up one week later in the 2014 Davis Cup final to triumph over France. Off-court drama should be non-existent in this one, but another high-quality contest can be expected. After all, both men emerged from round-robin competition with plenty of reasons to be confident.
Federer swept through Group Stan Smith in undefeated fashion, beating Tomas Berdych, Novak Djokovic, and Kei Nishikori. The 34-year-old dropped only one set–to Nishikori–in the process.
Wawrinka’s participation in the semis looked questionable at best as recently as Wednesday night. The world No. 4 was coming off a 6-3-, 6-2 loss to Rafael Nadal and found himself trailing David Ferrer 5-2 in the first set. Ferrer double-faulted on set point while serving for the opener and got broken to let his opponent back in the match. Ever since that moment, Wawrinka has not looked back. He overcame Ferrer 7-5, 6-2 then beat Andy Murray 7-6(4), 6-4 in a winner-advance, loser-go-home battle on Friday night.
“I had a tough match–two-hours match with a lot of pressure,” Wawrinka commented. “I also feel quite tired. I’m going to be focused on that, try to rest, try to recover and be ready for hopefully a good match…. [Roger] is playing really well. He is always fit; always ready. Last year was an opportunity to beat him [and I didn’t take it].
For a brief stretch during the second set against Murray, Wawrinka found the zone in which he bludgeons every backhand as hard as possible and does not miss. But his play this week has been marked with inconsistency, plagued by too many stretches in which he has borderline disappeared.
The undisputed two best players so far in London have been Nadal and Federer. Wawrinka was unable to overcome his rough patches of tennis against Nadal and he may not be able to against Federer, either.
Pick: Federer in 2
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Sorry wrong thread.
It was not a good performance by Stan, he was in a hurry to get off court, then again he was in a hurry to get off court yesterday but Murray beat him at being bad.
I agree about Stan not playing well against Fed today. He is capable of a lot more when he’s on his game. Murray was worse. Stan was missing shots that he would make in his sleep. It’s true that Fed was being ultra aggressive, but what else is new.
Stan has been out of sorts for a long time and his complicated personal life isn’t helping his cause either. . He’s ready to boil over with frustration at any moment and lash out wildly at crucial moments with disastrous results. Federer played a near flawless match and ruthlessly exploited Stans weaknesses.