Roger Federer will have the chance to clinch the last big prize in tennis eluding him after putting Switzerland into a 2-1 lead against France in the Davis Cup final on Saturday.
The 17-time Grand Slam champion and Stan Wawrinka swept aside Julien Benneteau and Richard Gasquet 6-3, 7-5, 6-4 in the doubles, and Federer can secure the decisive point against Jo-Wilfied Tsonga in the first reverse singles on Sunday.Federer and Wawrinka, who won doubles gold at the 2008 Olympics, ended a four-game losing streak in Davis Cup at the right time, and posted their first win together in the event in three years. It was also their first doubles win on clay.
They did not concede a single break and dominated the key points to withstand their opponents’ charge in the second set.The teams ended the opening singles on Friday level, after Wawrinka defeated Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Federer lost in straight sets to Gael Monfils.
Monfils shocks Fedex
Honours were shared between France and Switzerland in the Davis Cup final in lille on a day when Roger Federer suffered his worst ever defeat in the tournament.
The 17-time Grand Slam champion, playing in his first Davis Cup final at the age of 33, was clobbered 6-1, 6-4, 6-3 by flamboyant Frenchman Gael Monfils. It was just the second time that Federer had lost a Davis Cup singles rubber in straight sets — the other coming in his debut as an untested teenager in 1999 against Gianluca Pozzi of Italy.
Federer took a 8-2 winning head-to-head record against Monfils into the rubber. But his preparations for his first ever Davis Cup final took a hit last Saturday when he injured his back playing, ironically against Wawrinka, in the last four of the ATP World Tour finals in london.