TENNIS – Roger Federer recovered from a set and a break down against Tomas Berdych with a 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 victory to clinch his sixth Dubai title and his 78th career win in his 115th final at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships, a ATP 500 Tournament.
Federer and Berdych met for their 18th head-to-head match. Berdych beat their last two matches against Federer in the 2012 US Open quarter finals and in the 2013 Dubai semifinals but this time Federer was unstoppable. The Swiss 17-time Grand Slam champion showed signs of his past glorious tennis in the second and third sets and was able to recover from a set down. Federer won his first ATP title since last June when he won his favourite Halle Tournament on grass, It’s the 14th consecutive year that Federer wins at least one tournament. Federer broke Berdych’s unbeaten streak of 11 consecutive match wins.
Federer played his eighth final in Dubai. Before today’s match he won five times and lost twice in 2006 against Nadal and in 2011 against Djokovic. Berdych played his second consecutive final in Dubai after losing last year against Novak Djokovic and his second final this year two weeks after winning in Rotterdam. The Czech player has a 9-12 record in his 21 career finals.
Federer broke serve to love in the third game of the opening set to take a 2-1 lead but Berdych broke back immediately. Federer made three forehand mistakes enabling Berdych to break serve again in the fourth game. Berdych won a tough fifth game at deuce after leading 40-15. Berdych got the decisive break in the sixth game to 30 to open up a 4-2 lead before winning his fourth consecutive game for 5-2. In the ninth game Berdych went down 0-30 but he rallied to close out the first set with 6-3.
Berdych earned three break points in the fifth game of the second set. Federer managed to save the first two with an ace but Berdych converted the third chance to go up a break for 3-2 as the Swiss sent a forehand wide. Federer hit two forehand winners before Berdych made an unforced error with his backhand to drop serve for 3-all.
The match changed completely. Federer did not drop a single point on his serve and broke to love in the tenth game to force the match to the third set.
Federer won the first game of the third set and went up 40-0 on Berdych’s serve but the Czech player saved all the break point chances by reeling off .five straight points.
Berdych rallied from 0-30 to take the lead 40-30 and earned a break ball chance for 2-1 but Federer fended it off with a forehand winner.
Berdych did not recover and Federer earned three break point chances at 40-0 and converted it at the second chance as Berdych sent a forehand long. Federer produced a superb drop-shot to hold serve and increase his lead to 4-1.
The match was not finished as Federer faced two break back ball chances at 4-2, 15-40 but he managed to save them. Berdych saved two match points at 2-5 but Federer closed out in the ninth game as Berdych fired his return wide and clinched his sixth win in Dubai in just under two hours.
He had already lifted the Dubai Trophy in 2003,2004, 2005, 2007 and 2012. With this title Federer overtakes John McEnroe in third place in the all-time leaders list. The Swiss legend has won at least one ATP title every year since 2000. He now leads 12-6 in his head-to-head matches against Berdych.
“I was happy I was able to use momentum and win the second set. The nit was a tough opening period in the third, wasting the love.40 game on Tomas’ first service game. I saved break points myself. Anything could have happened there. Things definitely went my way out tonight.but I have had a lot of tougher matches in the last one and a half years, so this is nice to get a lucky break again”, said Federer.
Berdych expressed his disappointment after the match after qualifying for the final without dropping a set in the whole tournament. “I would say many things went wrong. The match started pretty well I had really many chances and then basically I gave him the game and that’s it. It’s very disappointing for me the way I handled the situation. I don’t keep the losses in my head for a long time. I will try to learn from the mistakes in the second set and to take the positives from that.”
