Roger Federer began his bid for winning a record ninth title at the Gerry Weber Open in Halle after he produced a clinical performance to pull off a 6-4 7-6 conquest of Jan-Lennard Struff in the first round of the ATP 500 tournament on Wednesday.
The top-seeded Swiss lost just two off his 35 points on first serve as he didn’t put up even a single break point on offer for his German adversary to emerge victorious in straight sets after grinding it out for 72 minutes in front of 12,000 spectators.
Federer, however, agreed in post-match press conference that it wasn’t as easy an outing as the scoreline suggests. The Swiss was incessantly pushed back by his big-serving opponent, but his own serve was also too hot to handle for Struff.
“It was hard to find a rhythm against Struff. He has a big serve, especially the first one. I thought I did that very well. He never really had chances on my own serve, so that was comforting,” the 34-year-old was quoted as saying by the ATP World Tour.
The Swiss further opined that should he be able to continue this way, he will be dangerous for anybody.
“I don’t want to get too carried away but I feel like if I serve the way I did today and I’m able to step it up just a little bit on the return from the baseline, all of a sudden I’m dangerous for anybody,” added Federer, who meets Malek Jaziri in the second round.
Elsewhere, in-form Austrian Dominic Thiem brushed aside Joao Sousa 7-5 6-4 to get his campaign off to a winning start. However, Kei Nishikori, the No. 2 seed, conceded a walkover to Florian Mayer after withdrawing due to a rib injury.
