Djokovic Outpaces Federer, Reaches World #2 (Again)

Novak Djokovic extended his 2011 match winning streak to 17-0 by defeating Roger Federer 6-3 3-6 6-2 in the semifinals of the Indian Wells ATM Masters Series 1000 tournament. Federer's 2011 record is now 18-3, with all three losses coming at the hands of the new World #2 Serbian. The two were playing for the right to face World #1 Rafael Nadal in the final; the Spaniard defeated Juan Martin del Potro 6-4 6-4 despite facing 0-3 and 1-4 deficits in the first set.

The match between Federer and Djokovic highlighted the improved serving of Djokovic as well as the advantage the Serb's two-handed backhand is over the Swiss's beautiful but less powerful one-handed backhand. At this point in his career, Federer goes through bad patches where his preternatural feel for the tennis ball on his strings seems to lose him entirely and he has difficulty keeping the ball in the court. In the third set, after cleaning up his game to win the second (his first set won in thelast three matches with Djokovic), Federer was broken early and was down 0-2 when he broke back (on a Djokovic double fault) to reach 2-2. Then, inexplicably serving at 40-15 Federer was unable to win another point and donated the service game on a double fault. The 16-time major champion never came close to winning another game after that. It should be interesting what Federer does to tinker with his game in order to react to the new reality of his rivalry with Djokovic. There's a huge difference between Federer being ranked World #2 and World #3 because it means he could face his nemesis Nadal in semifinals of major tournaments, instead of being separated by the entire field in Grand Slam draws.

The final match-up between Djokovic and Nadal should be a good one; I like the Serb's chances to win his 18th match of the year and third tournament (2011 Australian Open over Andy Murray and 2011 Dubai Duty Free Open over Federer) in 2011.

Interestingly, Federer teamed up with his compatriot Stanislas Wawrinka to beat Nadal and Marc Lopez in the doubles semifinal but then lost the doubles final 6-4 6-7(5) 10-8 to Xavier Malisse and Andrew Dologopolov. Not a good weekend for the Swiss!