Roger Federer finds himself one match away from securing a place in tennis' history books and perhaps being considered the greatest player all-time. The 27-year-old Swiss superstar advanced to his fourth consecutive Roland Garros championship after rallying to defeat World No. 5 Juan Martin del Potro 3-6, 7-6(2), 2-6, 6-1, 6-4, on Friday.
Federer, who has come up short in the past three Roland Garros finals against arguably the greatest clay-courter of all-time, Rafael Nadal, will take on the Spaniard's conqueror, No. 23-seeded Robin Soderling, who will appear Sunday in his first tour-level clay court final. Federer is 9-0 lifetime against the Swede (19-1 in sets), including 2-0 on clay.
Despite his dominance of Soderling and unrivaled experience in Grand Slam finals, Federer rejected suggestions that he is a lock to win the final. "Look, there's no easy Grand Slam finals,” he said. “It's very simple, because the one who is on the other side of the net has also won six matches and is definitely in the shape of his life.
"I cannot obviously underestimate Robin, even though I've beaten him I think in the [nine] matches we've played against each other. But obviously it's nice to see someone else for a change in the French Open finals. I've been there before. I don't know if it's an advantage or not, because I've never been able to win. I'm sure the pressure is big for both players, not only for me, but also for him. It's his first big step in a Grand Slam. I'm sure we're going to play some good tennis, because I thought he played we will really well today against Gonzalez."
Federer is one match away from becoming the sixth man to win all four Grand Slam championships in his career and from tying Pete Sampras' mark of 14 Grand Slam titles. Andre Agassi was the last man to complete a career Grand Slam 10 years ago at Roland Garros. Other players who have accomplished the feat are: Fred Perry in 1935, Don Budge in 1938, Rod Laver (1962 and '69) and Roy Emerson (1964).
Federer is making his 19th trip to a Grand Slam singles final (13-5), including 15 of the past 16 title matches. His 19 finals equal Ivan Lendl's mark (8-11).
This has been Federer's toughest road to a Grand Slam final, losing six sets along the way, including a five-setter against Tommy Haas (from two sets down) in the fourth round and four-set battles in the second and third rounds.
"It feels great coming through tough matches like this," said Federer. "It's more emotional. It's more satisfaction, even though I love matches when I can really dominate an opponent. But this is also a great feeling of coming through this way, not the easy way, showing different qualities. It's not always something I've actually had a chance to show, because matches were over too quickly sometimes. It's good for me, so my career hopefully is going to be longer because of those matches, in the long run."
In the opening set, del Potro broke in the fifth and ninth games to secure his first set won (of 13) in their six meetings. Both players held throughout the second set before Federer took control of the tie-break. He led 5-1 before closing it out 7-2. In the third set, the Argentine broke in the opening game and again in the seventh game to take a 2-1 sets lead.
Federer failed to break del Potro in the first three sets before finally converting in the fourth game. The 20-year-old Argentine double-faulted to lose serve in the sixth game and Federer closed out the set with his fifth ace to even the match.
In the opening game of the fifth set, Federer broke when del Potro hit a forehand long. Federer was broken in the sixth game but broke back in the next game as del Potro double-faulted. Federer failed to convert on his first match point on del Potro's serve in the ninth game but sealed the three hour and 28-minute victory with a forehand winner on match point.
Although del Potro converted five of 13 break points to Federer's four of 12 and led in aces (16 to 5) and winners (55 to 50), the Tandil native struggled on second serve. Federer won 52 per cent of second serve points to del Potro's 43 percent.
Del Potro, who was appearing in his first Grand Slam semi-final, was the first Argentine since David Nalbandian in 2006 to reach the semi-finals at Roland Garros.
"Well, now I feel so sad. It was a long match, very close," said del Potro. "It was my first semi-final and I had the chance. I think I'm playing better than Australia where we played on another surface. I served very good every moment in the match and that was the reason it went to five sets."
(From Website : http://www.atpworldtour.com/TENNIS/1/EN/NEWS/NEWSARTICLE_3879.ASP)
