After a disappointing week in Madrid, Roger Federer looks sharp after his first two matches in Rome, the final event before the French Open. After dismantling Potito Starace 6-1, 6-2, he did the same to Frenchman Gilles Simon on Thursday 6-1, 6-2 also to advance into the quarterfinals.
Quite simply, Federer has been sublime in his first two matches and this is the best he has looked since the Australian Open in January. He is serving well, using all the variety that he has at his disposal, and perhaps most importantly, he is keeping his intensity high point after point, game after game.
Usually in early rounds, Roger coasts after getting the one break he needs to win each set. So far this week in Rome, he has looked to keep his foot on the throttle even when he is comfortably in front, and that way of playing will serve him well when going up against the top guys. Case in point against Simon at 4-2 in the 2nd set. Simon had a few chances to hold serve and Fed had five break point chances, of which he converted on the 5th. Three of the five break point chances Simon earned the point. When he had game point chances to keep it close however, Fed didn't relent and didn't let the game slip away. The intensity in his game never dropped and he knew that losing that game would keep Simon within distance to strike back.
Playing Starace in the second round was pretty easy and the level that he played at was certainly not required for him to win comfortably, though it was wonderful to see. Simon, however, has given the Maestro trouble with his consistent play. They first played in Toronto 2008 when Fed was in a terrible slump and at the Masters Cup a few months later he had a back injury that severely hampered his movement. At the Australian Open two years ago, Fed got off to a blazing start but the Frenchman hung around and forced Roger to play his best to get the win.
Tactically, Federer played a near flawless match against the pesky Simon. Gilles loves to counter-punch and feed off pace, so what did Roger do? He sliced nearly half the time from the baseline and used many drop shots to get Simon off the baseline, and to a place where he is very uncomfortable, the net.
For the match, Roger hit 21 winners to 18 errors, though those numbers really don't mean much as whenever you play Simon you will have your fair share of errors because you are playing so many 8+ shot rallies. He served at 73% and won 83% of his 2nd serve points. Pretty solid numbers. Simon hit 26 unforced errors but many of those errors I saw as him going for more than he was comfortable with, which is what Roger forces you to do when he's in the zone.
In the quarterfinals Fed will play Jerzy Janowicz who has beaten Tsonga and Gasquet back-to-back. He is a confident fellow and Roger will need to be as sharp as he was in his first two matches as he has a big game and plenty of weapons. But Fed loves playing the young guns and you know he'll be fired up to play Janowicz for the first time.
If he gets by that match he will play the winner of the Granollers vs Paire match, and then a final against likely one of Nadal or Djokovic. He may have more of a chance that he might usually have against those two on clay because of the draw. Rafa will have to go through Ferrer which is going to be a physical match and Djokovic has to get by Berdych, who, in spite of never beating the Serb is no slouch. If both Rafa and Novak advance then they will beat each other up and will have a short time to regroup against a (likely) fresh Federer.
Let's hope Roger can keep up this masterful play!
Kyle.
PS - as crazy as it sounds, I think the short hair that Roger has displayed this week has done him a world of good. In his book "Winning Ugly" Brad Gilbert noted that when things weren't going his way during a match, a shirt change would give him a recharge of sorts, and something tells me the haircut may be a kind of mental rejuvenation after a tough few months to start the season.
But maybe I have it all wrong and he just cut it because it's hot in Rome this week.
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