ATP Tour Finals 2010: Federer Defeats Nadal 6-3 3-6 6-1

As predicted, Roger Federer of Switzerland won his 5th ATP Tour Final championships on Sunday in London  by defeating World #1 Rafael Nadal of Spain 6-3 3-6 6-1 in 97 minutes. Federer joined Ivan Lendl and Pete Sampras as the third man to win the tour-ending championship for the 5th time, which he had previously won in 2003 (d. Andre Agassi), 2004 (d. Lleyton Hewitt), 2006 (d. James Blake), and 2007 (d. David Ferrer). Interestingly, it was also the 4th time he won the Australian Open (the first tournament of the year) and the season-ending championship in the same year (2004, 2006, 2007 and 2010). (Novak Djokovic was able to achieve the same feat in 2008.)

Federer improved to a career record of 8 wins, 14 losses against his arch nemesis (with the clay court record of 2 wins and 10 losses), who is now regularly being called the greatest clay court player of all time. Federer won his 66th ATP tour title, placing him firmly in fourth position on the all-time list, a mere 11 titles behind John McEnroe at 77, Lendl at 94 and Jimmy Connors at 107.

Nadal is firmly ensconced at #1 and basically has no ranking points to defend until the clay court season. The earliest Federer could challenge for the #1 ranking again is probably Wimbledon 2011. It should be an exciting year!

ATP Tour Finals: Semifinal Review and Final Preview

World #1 Rafael Nadal will face World #2 Roger Federer in the final match of the 2010 ATP tennis season at the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals in London today. As MadProfessah predicted on Friday, Federer was able to dismiss World #3 Novak Djokovic in straight sets while World #5 Andy Murray put up a stern challenge to prevent this 22nd meeting in the storied rivalry between the two greatest players of their generation.

Semifinals Review

The two semifinals were thrilling in their own way. Federer demolished the Serb in a 6-1 6-4 match which was not as close as the score reveals. Essentially, Federer won two 6-1 sets but went through "a bad patch" at the beginning of the second set where he lost 3 consecutive games. The Swiss quickly recovered and dispatched Djokovic to continue his preparation for next week's Davis Cup Final matchup versus France in Belgrade.

The Nadal-Murray match was one of the best matches of the year, with the Spaniard (barely) prevailing 7-6(5) 3-6 7-6(6). There were some incredible 27 and 36(!) stroke rallies in the first set, with  incredibly high quality tennis on both sides of the net. Murray basically lost the first set because after enjoying a hot serving streak for the majority of the set, in the tiebreaker he couldn't buy a first serve. If you can't serve well, it makes it very difficult to win  a tiebreaker where every point is effectively a breakpoint. Interestingly the second set was similar to the second set in the Federer-Djokovic match where after basically playing to a draw at 3-all suddenly Nadal went through a bad patch  and lost 3 games in a row. (Murray grew more aggressive and was able to break Nadal twice in ten minutes to win the set). In the third set Nadal got the early break and served for the match at 5-4 where, inexplicably, he was broken after holding a match point. Would he be able to prevail in the inevitable tiebreak? It didn't look like it when Murray won the first three points of the tiebreak and led 4-2 on the change over. However, as usual, Nadal did not give up and won the mini-break back to hold a second match point 5-6 on Murray's serve.Murray was able to defend that point with some incredible gets and at 6-6 went for a huge cross-court winner which flew a couple inches wide giving Nadal his third match point on his serve. The World #1 was able to win the match point with his patented inside-out cross-court forehand winner into the far corner of the court to reach the Tour Final for the first time in his storied career.

Finals Preview

This is the 22nd meeting between the 24-year-old 9-time grand slam champion and the 29-year-old 16-time grand slam champion. The younger player enjoys a 14-7 career head-to-head edge; all but 4 of their meetings have been in finals (where Nadal leads 12-5) but at the season-ending championships Federer leads 2-0 (but those wins came when Nadal was usually exhausted at the end of the season). In hard court finals, Nadal leads 2-1 (2009 Australian Open final, 2006 Dubai final). Nadal is also experiencing one of history's greatest seasons ever, having won every clay court match he played this year and winning the last three consecutive grand slam titles with a better than even shot of claiming the "Nadal slam" in Melbourne in a few months.

There are four possibilities for the match result (tabulated below with associated estimated probabilities)

Match Result              Probability
Federer wins in 2 sets        33% 
Nadal wins in 2 sets          17%
Federer wins in 3 sets        20%
Nadal wins in 3 sets          30%

This computes to a 53% chance for Federer to win with a 47% chance for Nadal, if there is an equally likelihood of a 2-set and 3-set match. Actually, looking at their 21 previous matches, only 8 of their matches have gone the distance. All that being said, the match should be close and exciting!

MadProfessah's prediction: Federer in 2 sets; Nadal in 3 sets with a distinct edge to whomever wins the first set.

ATP Tour Finals: Federer v Djokovic, Nadal v Murray Semifinals

The semifinals of the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals are set: Roger Federer will play Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal will play Andy Murray. Federer and Nadal are undefeated through the first three round-robin rounds with Nadal only dropping his very first set of the tournament against Andy Roddick, although Djokovic should probably have won the first set in their match. Federer was pretty lucky not to lose the first set against Robin Soderling.

That being said, Nadal has a 8-4 career edge against Murray, a 14-7 lead against Federer and a 15-7 lead against Djokovic. He is, after all, the World's #1 player and the current holder of 3 of the 4 major title, having won 3 in a row in 2010. He has never won this tournament, because he's usually dead tired by this point in the season. He did not play in 2008 and lost all 3 round-robin matches last year. However, it's 2010 and I expect him to at least get to the final, where I suspect he will play Federer in a mouth-watering final. Although Nadal leads the Greatest Of All Time in their overall head-to-head and beat him once this year as well as the last time they met on a hard court (the inexplicable 2009 Australian Open final), their hard court record head-to-head is tied 3-3 with Federer beating Nadal twice in the semifinals of the year-ending championships in 2006 and 2007. However, in Finals one would have to give the edge to Nadal (12-5).

Can Novak and Andy stop another Fedal final? Possibly, since Murray sports a 2-1 lead over Nadal (4-4 career on hard courts) this year, both time winning on hard courts including the last time they played in the semifinals of Toronto (where Murray also beat Federer). His single loss to Nadal came in London earlier this year in the Wimbledon semis. For all intents and purposes that was the equivalent of a Tour final. Murray himself has been lowering expectations about his chances against Nadal (and Federer) in his press conferences this week. However, I think he probably has the best chance of the four of preventing Nadal from winning his first tour championships.

While Nadal faces the person most likely to beat him, Federer plays the person least likely to beat him. (He beat Murray this week in round-robin play but has an overall 5-8 losing record to the Scot.) Djkovic trails Federer 6-12 in their career match-up, including 1-3 for the year. Of course that one win was in the semifinals of the 2010 US Open where Federer held two match points and lost. One does feel if the match is close, Federer will likely lose it. Ever since then, Federer has beaten Novak relatively easily and I expect that will be the case tomorrow.

MadProfessah's predictions: Nadal defeats Murray in 3 sets; Federer defeats Djokovic in 2 sets.

ATP Tour Finals: Federer Gets Revenge On Murray 6-4 6-2

 

World #1 Roger Federer defeated hometown favorite Andy Murray 6-4 6-2 to win his second round-robin match at the Barclay's ATP Tour Finals in London. Federer improved his win-loss career record to the young Scot to 6 wins out of 14 matches played. Murray had beaten Federer the last two times they met this year, both times in Masters finals (in Shanghai and in Toronto). Of course, Federer has beaten Murray in the two major finals they have competed in (2010 Australian Open and 2008 US Open ).

Murray beat Robin Soderling and so in order to make the semifinals of the ATP World Tour finals, Murray will need to beat David Ferrer in straight sets in order to reach the semifinals. Federer will just need to win a set off of Soderling to clinch a semifinal berth if Soderling does not beat Ferrer today.

The other half of the draw has Rafael Nadal, Andy Roddick, Tomas Berdych and Novak Djokovic. Djokovic and Nadal have wins over Berdych and Roddick, respectively so far.

Arrived in London!

I'm in London now... still recovering from jet lag...

World ATP Finals: Federer v. Davydenko, Soderling v. del Potro

Despite losing to Juan Martín Del Potro in their round robin match 2-6 7-6(5) 3-6, World #1 Roger Federer (and the 20-year-old reigning US Open Champion who beat him) advanced to the semifinals of the World ATP Finals in London on Thursday in Group A. Local favorite Andy Murray became the first person ever eliminated in the year-end round-robin fault due to the percentage of games won (50.57% to del Potro's 51.14% and Federer's 52.38%). If Federer had won one more game against del Potro or Murray had lost one less game against Federer (or won more game against Verdasco), the Brit would have qualified instead.

In the other group, defending champion Novak Djokovic was eliminated after winning 4 sets and losing 3 compared to Nikolay Davydenko who won 5 sets and losing 3 and Robin Soderling who won 5 sets and lost 2. In both groups the Spanish player lost all 3 matches (Fernando Verdasco and Rafael Nadal) and the other players all won 2 matches and lost 1. In group A, all matches went to three sets!

In the semifinals, Federer will face Davydenko, whom he has never lost to in a dozen ATP Tour matches while Soderling will face del Potro. del Potro has beaten the tall Swede in hard courts once this year (and also had a walkover over Soderling on his way to winning the Washington ATP tournament this summer over Andy Roddick). However, Soderling has beaten del Potro on carpet indoors in his hometown tournament (in 2007).

I predict another del Potro versus Federer match-up in the final. It will be interesting to see if the 15-time champion can come up with a solution to the 6'6" powerful young Argentine player with the 135+ mph first serve and the ability to his 100 mph winners on both wings. I suspect it will be another three set match, with Federer prevailing this time.

MadProfessah's pick: Federer over Davydenko in straight sets, del Potro over Soderling in three sets.

ATP Year-End Championships Starts

The last tournament of the year on the men's side starts today in London, the Barclays ATP World Your Finals (formerly known as the ATP Masters Series Championships). Last year's tournament was won by Novak Djokovic.

Here's the draw:

Group A
Roger Federer (SUI)
Andy Murray (GBR)
Juan Martin del Potro (ARG)
Fernando Verdasco (ESP)

Group B
Rafael Nadal (ESP)
Novak Djokovic (SRB)
Nikolay Davydenko (RUS)
Robin Soderling (SWE)

Hat/tip to Craig Hickman. If Nadal gets further than Federer, the Spaniard could end the year at #1 for the second consecutive year, despite Federer appearing in Four grand slam finals this year and winning two (Roland Garros and Wimbledon), while Nadal won one (Australia).