Judging from their history, Roger Federer and Igor Andreev were looking at a competitive match in the second round of the BNP Paribas Open. The two, separated by two years in age—Federer is 29 and Andreev is 27—have played only three times, but all were in best-of-five set matches. Federer won each encounter, but Andreev took one of the first three sets from Federer each time.
Federer avoided that position on Sunday with a straight-sets victory, 7-5, 7-6 (4).
The first set was a story of missed chances early on. Federer had love-30 at 2-all and 3-all but couldn’t get the break, despite holding two break points on the second occasion—on the first chance, he missed a forehand that tipped the net and went wide.
Finally, at 5-all, Federer broke through to love with an equal measure of winners and unforced errors, and served out the set in four points, finishing with an ace.
Andreev has dropped from a career high of No. 18 in 2008 to No. 96, while Federer still inhabits one of the top two positions in the game. The disparity looked like it might play out in the second set when Federer broke in the opening game and soon had a 2-0 lead. But, after going up 30-love on serve at 2-1, he lost eight points in a row and Andreev, given an opening, took it and soon led 3-2.
The Russian loves to pound his forehand and began to take some big cuts on it, as well as with his backhand. The set became very competitive, and three times Federer had to defend 30-30 on his serve before it finally went to a tiebreak.
Andreev hit a forehand long on the very first point. Federer then won two points on his serve and was a net cord, in Andreev’s favor, away from taking a 4-0 lead. In keeping with his go-for-broke style of play, Andreev pulled off a monster forehand winner at 3-2 to level the tiebreak. But at 4-4, Andreev’s evil twin shanked a forehand long, giving Federer the opening he needed. Two more errors from the Russian wrapped up the match in an hour and 34 minutes.
There were a few patches during this contest when Federer lost touch with his best form, but on balance it was a very positive performance for an opening-rounder—although he did have the advantage of playing doubles on Friday when he and partner Stanislas Wawrinka eliminated second seeds Daniel Nestor and Max Mirnyi, 6-1, 6-2.
The serving numbers were bad and good for Federer—a poor first-serve percentage of 54 percent, but an excellent 92 percent of first-serve points won.
What might have been most reassuring for Federer was his backhand down the line. With Andreev ever eager to go far to his left to whale his inside-out forehand, Federer kept him honest by hitting a number of effective backhands down the line. It is a bit of a barometer shot early in a tournament.
“I think I played really well for a first round,” the Swiss said afterward. “It was a fun match.”
Next up for him on Tuesday will be Juan Ignacio Chela. He is 5-0 against the No. 32-ranked Argentine, 31, and has lost just one set in those matches.
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