Swiss top seed Roger Federer recovered from his major scare in the previous round to cruise into the quarterfinals of the Australian Open with a straight sets victory over Tomas Berdych on Monday.
The 12-time Grand Slam champion overcame the Czech 13th seed, 6-4, 7-6 (9/7), 6-3 in one hour 59 minutes and will play American 12th seed James Blake in the last eight.
Federer was backing up after he was was taken to five gripping sets by Serbian Janko Tipsarevic over almost four-and-a-half hours in the third round.
But any concerns over his physical state disappeared despite being behind in the second set tiebreaker against Berdych.
”I’m quite pleased with the result pulling up from a tough match against Tipsarevic who played a fantastic match,” Federer said.
”Tomas has been playing well and he’s always a dangerous guy on any surface and it’s unfortunate for him, but I’m very happy and hope to keep going.”
Berdych had two set points in the second set tiebreaker but failed to cash in.
”He was playing better than me to be honest in the second set, he got the early lead, he played well in the tiebreak and I didn’t make the serves I needed to and in the end he made a wrong shot selection,” added Federer.
Federer said he ate dinner at 1am and had a massage after his marathon match with Tipsarevic on Saturday which almost tipped him out of the tournament.
Berdych, who beat Federer at the 2004 Athens Olympics, made too many costly forehand errors to keep the pressure on the top seed.
Federer broke his serve three times and dominated the points 105 to 85 to run out a comfortable winner.
Berdych made 27 unforced errors, while Federer did as he pleased with 45 winners.
The Swiss is chasing his fourth Australian title and has won his last 18 matches at the season-opening major, eight short of the best held by American Andre Agassi between 2000 and 2004.
Federer is also after his 13th Grand Slam title, which will place him just one off American Pete Sampras’ record of 14.
He claimed the opening set with a service break in the ninth with a beautiful forehand winner and clinched it on the second of three sets point in the next serving game.
Berdych broke the top seed’s serve in the second game of the second set but was broken back in the fifth after going three break points down.
But the Czech missed two great opportunities to level the match in the tiebreaker.
He had set points at 6-5 and 7-6 but faltered under pressure with two forehand errors as Federer jumped to a 2-0 sets lead on his first set point when Berdych overhit a forehand.
Berdych again dropped a service break in the sixth game of the final set with another wild forehand and Federer cruised to victory. – AFP
