Federer Survives Wawrinka Comeback; Eyes 18th Major Crown

Roger Federer will attempt to win his 18th Grand Slam championship against his old foe Rafael Nadal or Grigor Dimitrov on Sunday after a battling performance in the Australian Open semi-finals.

The 35-year-old Swiss superstar, who had returned to top-level tennis after a six-month injury lay-off, booked a spot in his 28th Grand Slam final with a 7-5, 6-3, 1-6, 4-6, 6-3 victory over his compatriot Stan Wawrinka, the 2014 titlist and fourth seed. Federer will now compete for his fifth crown in his sixth Australian Open final on Sunday night, when he will attempt to become the first No. 17 seed to win a major since Pete Sampras won the final professional match of his career at the 2002 US Open.

Federer, who is now 86-13 at the Australian Open, will take a 5-0 advantage over No. 15 seed Dimitrov into his 28th Grand Slam championship final (17-8 record). But he trails 14-time major winner and 2009 champion Nadal 11-23 in their FedEx ATP Head2Head series.

Federer applied early pressure, forcing Wawrinka to recover from 0/40 on serve at 1-2 – Infosys ATP Scores & Stats indicates he did so on nine of 26 occasions in 2016. Although Federer came through his own test, from 15/40 in the next game, he did do a good job of keeping Wawrinka off-balance by varying the direction of his groundstrokes. Federer survived a break point at 5-5, 30/40 and was soon gifted two straight errors from Wawrinka to take the 50-minute opener.

In the second set, Wawrinka went into meltdown at 2-3 when two errors saw his serve get broken – as well as a racquet – to give Federer full control of their 22nd meeting. Although Wawrinka continued to battle, he left the court in tears at the end of the second set. The 31 year old would now need to come back from an 0-2 sets deficit for the seventh time in his career.

With strapping just below his right knee, following an off-court medical time-out, Wawrinka took his first tentative steps. Initially slow to move off his right leg, he grew in confidence and broke Federer’s serve with a forehand winner for a 3-1 advantage. Federer’s intensity dropped and two more breaks soon followed for Wawrinka and in a run of six games he led 1-0 in the fourth set.

Although Federer broke back immediately for 1-1, fast forward to 4-4 and he was in big trouble at 0/40. Federer saved two with well-direct serves, but terrific movement from Wawrinka at 30/40 enabled him to flick a forehand crosscourt winner to break. The crowd were left stunned, as the match went to a fifth and deciding set.

Wawrinka narrowly missed a forehand down the line at 1-1, 30/40, with Federer in a perilous position at the net. Wawrinka then recovered from 0/30 in the net game, before missing another break point at 2-2. When Wawrinka struck a mid-court backhand long at 2-3, 15/30, the match turned in Federer’s favour. Federer was not to be denied and will now play his 100th match at the Australian Open against Nadal or Dimitrov.

Federer, who is now 19-3 lifetime against Wawrinka – a winner in all of their hard-court meetings, hit 47 winners, including 11 aces. He also converted four of his nine break point opportunities for victory in three hours and four minutes. Wawrinka went 4/12 on break points, but went 56/86 on first serve points in comparison to 62/86 for Federer.