US Open: Clean Progress For Federer
No ‘through-the-legs’ shot, nor any single tricky showed by Roger Federer in his second round under the Flushing Meadows sun. The Swiss, who didn’t lose any of the sets yet in the first two rounds, beat German left-handed Andreas Beck in three straight ‘in-mirror’ sets, 6-3, 6-4, 6-3. Second seeded at the US Open, Federer needed 100 minutes in order to assure his place into the next round where he will meet French Paul Henri Mathieu, who also passed his compatriot Guillaume Rufin in three sets. The 29-year-old Roger, five-time winner at Flushing Meadows makes in this way a step towards the dream final against Nadal, who is part of the first half of the table and follows to meet Denis Istomin in the second round.
“It’s the perfect start. I played Monday, had two days off. I had another easy one physically today, and here I am in the third round feeling like I’m completely in the tournament,” Fedeer declared right after the match. Beck, who is 104 seeded, committed 11 double faults and 36 unforced errors to ‘help’ Federer remain cool on the road. “I got a sense for how the court speed is again. I got the sense of the crowd and the wind now as well. I played one night, one day. I have all the answers after two matches. Tougher matches will only be coming up now, I guess. I underestimate nobody. But today was already a little bit dangerous of an opponent. He hits hard, flat, and through the wind it’s not so easy to all of a sudden try to brush up the ball because you shank a lot so you start playing more careful. It’s gonna be interesting to see how the Saturday conditions are going to be with the hurricane sort of moving in. We’ll see how that goes,” the Swiss, who was just one step from winning his sixth US Open title last year, being defeated by Argentine Juam Martin del Potro, also added.
It was the same day 4 when third seeded Serbian Novak Djokovic made his progress into the third round. Scared of his compatriot Viktor Troicki, who was very close to oust third favorite in the first round pushing the match into the fifth set, Djokovic woke up and smashed German Philipp Petzschner in the second. It ended 7-5, 6-3, 7-6 to the Serbian who is expected to face James Blake into the next round at Flushing Meadows, the American also passing Canadian Peter Polansky in four sets. It was very shaky at the end of the match, but I was very fortunate to hold on,” Djokovic said in an interview, but also commented on his next opponent Blake who might be a real danger for the third ranked. “James always plays well here. He’s been so many years on this level, winning against a lot of top players. He knows how it feels like to play on a big stage in important matches. He’s a very aggressive player, and I have no doubt that he’s going to have that mindset when we step on the court. He’s going to try to take the ball early, and I have to be ready for that,” the Serbian added.
