Federer & Delpo To Clash In Epic Basel Showdown

The Swiss Indoors Basel final on Sunday is a blockbuster match-up between top seed and seven-time champion Roger Federer against 2012-13 winner and No. 4 seed Juan Martin del Potro. There is a lot at stake for both players with 200 Emirates ATP Ranking points on the line going to the champion (500 for the week). If Federer wins, he will trail No. 1 Rafael Nadal by 1,460 points going into ATP Masters 1000 Paris. If del Potro wins, he will move into the final spot for the season-ending Nitto ATP Finals in London.

This is their 24th meeting, the fourth in 2017 between the two superstars. Federer holds a 17-6 head-to-head advantage, including 12-6 on hard courts. Del Potro is 3-1 in finals. This is their fourth Basel meeting, third in a final. Federer won here in the second round in 2007 and del Potro won three-set finals in 2012-13. In their last meeting on Oct. 14 in the semi-finals at ATP Masters 1000 Shanghai, Federer won 3-6, 6-3, 6-3. Federer won the first meeting this season in the third round in Miami on March 27 before the Argentine won in the quarter-finals at the US Open on September 6.

Federer  is appearing in his 13th Basel final (7-5), the most tournament title matches in his career.  The 36-year-old Basel native has only been broken once this week (36 of 37 games held), that coming in the first set against Adrian Mannarino on Friday. He is making his eighth final showing of the season (6-1) and 144th in his career (94-49 in finals). If he captures his 95th title, he will be in 2nd place alone on the Open Era titles list. Ivan Lendl also has 94 titles. Halle (9) and Wimbledon (8) are the other tournaments Federer has won at least eight times.

Del Potro is making his third Basel final appearance and he won back-to-back titles in 2012-13. Last Sunday he won his 20th tour-level title in Stockholm and became the third Argentine in the Open Era with at least 20 titles, joining Guillermo Vilas (62) and Jose-Luis Clerc (25). The 29-year-old Argentine is trying to win back-to-back titles for the first time since 2012 when he captured titles in Vienna and Basel.

Del Potro, who was 47th in the Emirates ATP Race to London on August 28, will move into the final qualifying position for the Nitto ATP Finals in London with a title. He is 18-3 since the start of the US Open and 46-73 lifetime vs. Top 10 opponents (6-10 in 2017). The last time he beat Top 10 opponents in the semi-finals and final was the 2009 US Open, where he defeated No. 3 Nadal and No. 1 Federer in the last two rounds to pick up his biggest career title.

Tsonga Continues Nitto ATP Finals Push In Vienna Final Against Pouille 
The Erste Bank Open 500 championship on Sunday is an all-French match-up as eighth seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, the 2011 champion, takes on Lucas Pouille. This is the first all-French final in tournament history (since 1974) and the second this season on the ATP World Tour. Tsonga defeated Pouille in Marseille in February.

This is the third meeting between the Frenchmen — Tsonga won both matches 6-4, 6-4 in the third round of the Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters 2016 ATP Masters 1000 Monte-Carlo and in this year’s Open 13 Marseille final. Both players have accounted for all six French titles on the ATP World Tour this season, with Tsonga capturing four trophies and Pouille two.

Tsonga is appearing in his fifth ATP World Tour final of the season (4-0) and is trying to become the first Frenchman to win at least five singles titles in a year since Guy Forget won six in 1991. The 32-year-old Frenchman is appearing in his third Vienna final, having won the 2011 title (d. del Potro) and reaching the final last year (l. Murray). Tsonga, comes in with an ATP World Tour-best 20-2 indoor record this season, which includes titles in Rotterdam, Marseille and Antwerp.

Tsonga can pick up 200 points and improve to 2,510 points in the Emirates ATP Race To London standings, leaving him 95 points behind Pablo Carreno Busta, who holds the final spot going into Sunday. Juan Martin del Potro is in the Basel final and could move past the Spaniard with a title. If Tsonga wins, it would also be the 13th time this season a player has won an ATP World Tour title saving match point(s) (Dzumhur, 1 m.p. second round).

Pouille is appearing in his career-best fourth ATP World Tour final (2-1) of the season and is trying to become the first player this season to win titles on three different surfaces. He won on clay in Budapest (d. Bedene) and on grass in Stuttgart (d. Lopez) in June. This is his sixth career ATP World Tour final (3-2).

The 23-year-old has dropped only one set en route to his first Vienna final, in the semi-finals against Kyle Edmund. Pouille has 33 wins in 2017 and if he captures the title will equal last year’s career-best total.