SHAKEN BUT NOT DOWN

Mustafa Ozel | News | News, Tenis

Swiss star Roger Federer who is chasing the 85th singles title of his career, had another hard-fought win similar to the previous round to reach the final in Istanbul. On the inaugural edition of the clay-court event, TEB BNP Paribas Istanbul Open, the top seeded 33-year-old Swiss star had an unforeseen beginning, but battled his way back to topple Diego Schwartzman 2-6, 6-2, 7-5 to advance into his 128th overall final.

Losing the first set 6-2 versus Schwartzman just under half an hour under the shocking eyes of the crowd packing up Garanti Koza Arena, Federer found his rhythm to level the match at one set all with the same scoreline. In a compelling decisive set, both players held serves until the eleventh game in which Roger took advantage of Schwartzman’s low percentage of second serves. After his quarterfinal against Daniel Gimeno-Traver which lasted 2 hours and 27 minutes, this time Federer again laboured his way through another long match of 1 hour and 50 minutes, ending the third set 7-5.

Federer is now 3-0 against Schwartzman who got knocked out from his maiden tour level semi-final appearance. Having reached the 200th clay-court-win milestone, Federer will be seeking his 203th win in tomorrow’s final against Pablo Cuevas who stunned Grigor Dimitrov 6-2, 6-4.

ROGER STRUGGLES TO VICTORY

Mustafa Ozel | News | News, Tenis

Facing Daniel Gimeno-Traver in his second test at TEB PNB Paribas Istanbul Open, Roger Federer managed to make it to the semi-finals despite the unexpected struggle against his Spanish rival. Cheering the hustling grandstands of Garanti Koza Arena in the second match of the day, top seeded Swiss could not keep his break advantage losing his serve in the fourth game. Both players managed to hold their service games from then on before Federer won the tie-break by 7/3.

World number 62 Gimeno-Traver was the sweeping side at the beginning of the second set. Despite earning a break in the fourth game to lead 3-1, Spaniard could not manage to keep that advantage. Roger was in every service game of Gimeno-Traver and finally broke him while trailing at 5-3. However, second set ended with Gimeno-Traver winning three of the last four points in the 7/5 tie-break and leveling the match.

Saving break points early in the decisive set, Federer made the real move in the eighth game. Breaking Gimeno-Traver’s serve to lead 5-3, Federer did not make any mistake in his last service game to end the match. Reaching for the victory against Gimeno-Traver with 7-6(3), 6-7(5), 6-3 in 2 hours and 27 minutes, Federer hit 11 aces to set his semi-final encounter with Diego Schwartzman.

MAIDEN SEMI FOR SCHWARTZMAN
Today’s first match was between Diego Schwartzman and Santiago Giraldo. Playing his first ATP-level quarterfinal match, Schwartzman started the clash in a bad fashion but sealed a great comeback victory. No. 4 seed Giraldo took the first eight games and seemed poised to cruise to an easy win. From this point on, Schwartzman took the control of the match and won six games in a row.

Third set was hectic and it was the 22-year-old Argentine who held his nerves. Despite losing his serve twice, Schwartzman broke Giraldo’s serve four times and completed a phenomenal comeback to mark the scoreline at the end of 1 hour and 50 minutes, 0-6, 6-2, 6-2.