An imperious serving display from Roger Federer as he overcame the big-hitting Jeremy Chardy 7-5, 6-4 in 1 hour and 22 minutes to book his spot in the Indian Wells Quarter Finals. The Swiss was able to win all 25 points behind his first serve and dropped just five in total for the match and he is now just one win away from maintaining his Number 1 ranking until the clay swing.
The 5 time BNP Paribas Open champion will face South Korea's Hyeon Chung next in the Quarter Finals after his 6-1 6-3 win over Pablo Cuevas. The two met in January in the Australian Open semi-finals, where Federer led 6-1 5-2 before Chung retired with blisters so it should be interesting now Chung is back to full fitness.
Quick Match Recap
Federer won the toss and elected to receive. In windy conditions, the big-serving Chardy held from deuce for 1-0. Roger then levelled with a love hold and the pair exchanged further holds and the scoreboard ticked along to 3 games all.
In game seven Roger had his first break point thanks to a Chardy double fault but the Frenchman held for 4-3. That was soon five all but in game eleven the Swiss got the breakthrough, after two double faults in the game from Chardy including one on break point. Roger served it out to love, winning 7 points in a row to take it.
Into set two and Chardy started confidently with a love hold. Roger quickly levelled and both players looked dominant on serve with little inroad for the returner. That trend continued until game nine where Roger got lucky with a shanked return to make 30 all and although Chardy saved a break point at 30-40 Fed didn't let him off the hook, hitting a backhand winner to break for 5-4. he then served it out to love to move into the Quarters.
Match Stats
| Roger Federer | Jeremy Chardy | |
|---|---|---|
| Aces | 2 | 4 |
| Double Faults | 0 | 4 |
| 1st Serve | 51% (25/49) | 67% (52/78) |
| 1st Serve Points Won | 100% (25/25) | 71% (37/52) |
| 2nd Serve Points Won | 79% (19/24) | 38% (10/26) |
| Break Points Saved | 0% (0/0) | 60% (3/5) |
| Service Games Played | 11 | 11 |
| 1st Serve Return Points Won | 29% (15/52) | 0% (0/25) |
| 2nd Serve Return Points Won | 62% (16/26) | 21% (5/24) |
| Break Points Converted | 40% (2/5) | 0% (0/0) |
| Winers | 15 | 17 |
| Unforced Errors | 6 | 23 |
| Net Points Won | 100% (10/10) | 58% (7/12) |
| Return Games Played | 11 | 11 |
| Service Points Won | 90% (44/49) | 60% (47/78) |
| Return Points Won | 40% (31/78) | 10% (5/49) |
| Total Points Won | 59% (75/127) | 41% (52/127) |
| SABR | 0 | 0 |
Rally of the Match
Thoughts on the Match
A good win here from Roger against a big hitting confident opponent in the shape of Jeremy Chardy. The Frenchman served at an average of 130mph throughout the match and really went after his groundstrokes which made the scoreline close but he was never in the return games as Roger dropped just five points on serve during the match. I thought Fed played at a high level throughout and to win 100% behind your first serve in windy conditions is top drawer. Breaking just when he needed to has also been his hallmark against big servers and he as able to do that too, applying just enough pressure in games 11 and 9 in each set to come through.
Chardy deserves plaudits too, Fed said in his interview on the Tennis Channel he can't understand why he doesn't have better results as he has two big weapons and has given Fed a decent game in all five of their meetings now.
Predictions vs. Chung
Next up is Chung who has continued his impressive start to the season after overcoming the blisters his sustained down under. We didn't really see much of him when the two played in Australia as Chung threw in the towel during the second set but Roger obviously had the beating of him there.
However, I imagine this one will be closer as the South Korean probably like these conditions where his precise groundstrokes and good movement suit the surface. I've watched highlights of him against Berdych and Tomas just couldn't find a way through him from the back of the court. The Czech doesn't have the variety of the Swiss though so Fed is obviously the favourite going in, he'll need to defend his serve well which will be under a bit more pressure and look to manoeuvre Chung around and not get dragged into metronomic baseline play that Chungovic laps up. It's a night session so I'm not sure who it favours, it's slower so perhaps Chung, but it's also flatter which might favour Fed when he steps up the court.
Federer vs. Chardy Indian Wells 2018 Rating
Serving
Returning
Net Play
Winner to Unforced Error Ratio
Break Point Conversion
SERVERER
Didn't drop a single point behind his first serve and only lost 5 service points all match, broke decisively each set against a big-hitting opponent. Job done.
1st!
2nd?
IMPERIOUS! AND he’ll play Miami too…what treat for us!
GOod match from both, I was able to see it. Federer was really good on serve, but then looking at the stats his first serve percentage wasn’t too high. I guess he was going for it a lot more than usual because he clearly had a good winning % on them (!).
This will be a tough one coming up, Cheung will be motivated after his showing a the AO.
Ye 51% not the best, but no big deal as defended the 2nd great too.
Bah! I (thought I’d) refreshed this page and there was nothing new, went off to do some work, came back and looked, and saw the new thread title with “1 min ago” beside it. That was, of course, half an hour ago. Bang goes my first title of the year … 🙁
I still need to announce last years winner 😆 talk about behind schedule.
Please enlighten me what happens – I gather there is a test for the most first comments in a year?
I keep a track of people who comments first – https://www.perfect-tennis.com/comment-leaderboard/
End of year top 3 gets a prize. Which I still need to do as I’ve been too busy with other things. I did have it planned but then Rotterdam happened.
Brilliant rally – just the sort of tennis I like to watch! (Yes, Rafa, *that* is the sort of rally we want, not the monotonous slogging away from the baseline for 30 strokes). And excellent tweener from Chardy, too – I felt rather sorry that he lost that point.
They both smiled…
That could be the point of the year – so much fun to watch.
That tweener was great, never though he was going to get there and still made it.
well done
Thanks or your fast post 🙂 . I’ve caught with a few highlights. It appears that both of them played well. From Roger, not surprised. From Chardy, very surprised; he served big and hit big. As a whole he could be proud. On the next one – Chung, it will be alright, if Roger makes him run and goes after his serves.
Allez Rog!
Yehah 130mph + serves non stop, he has decent power.
Great stats 100% points won on 1st serves, only 6 UEs. Roger was very focus throughout the match which will help him a lot against Chung. The only thing I am not in favour is 7pm start time, this means conditions will be slower. Let’s do this Rog
The start time is no fair.
Five stars for the tennis photographers! Love their work. And love that point, so much fun to watch talent in motion.
Gloat, gloat…7pm my time. Toughest match yet.
Joke timing for the audience that matter. Europe.
A great match after we eventually got to see it after the interminable women.I think that Roger will deal with Chung pretty easily,Chung like all the New Gen doesn’t like coming to the net and Fed is surely too wily to get caught in a slug fest at the back of the court.Also I think Fed is pretty determined to keep the number one.Chung had trouble closing the match out yesterday which is surprising as Cuevas was useless.Goodness knows what his unforced error
count was.I suppose I could look it up if I could be bothered,which I am not.
[got to see it after the interminable women]
Those child birth screams produced more babies than people in the stands.
Thankfully TennisTv does not show WTA matches.
And to think I thought Halep was a Fed fan, wrecked my sleep.
Good match to watch and a good one to win. I thought both played so well. Was watching Delpo, I
was so sorry for Meyer he just lost it after the tie break…I thought JMD was going home. Didn’t see
Chung match but hard to believe the scoreline, Cuevas a good player. So C’mon Roger we need some
more of your magic serving be lucky x
Injury timeout for Del Po I heard, Mayer can be a bit of a mental walkabout guy…
“he is now just one win away from maintaining his Number 1 ranking until the clay swing.”
On t’other hand, if he doesn’t win, he loses No. 1. No pressure there, then 🙂
That’s certainly one way of looking at it 😀
Funnily enough I was not worried about this match as I decided to trust Fed to win. So he did.
Wasn’t a walkover though. Fed kindly won in two sets to let me get some sleep after 1 a.m.
Boo to Fed playing at 2 a.m. tomorrow morning.
Yeah power nap before hand is the only way 🙁
Thank you Jonathan for the quick and so well-written summary !
The Chung match will be at 3:00 am French time … in the middle of the night in France… not easy !
Yesterday evening, I was at the theatre until 10:45 pm … afraid of not being home on time for the beginning of the match :-)… but had to still wait for more than one hour until it started… but it was worth waiting. The second act of my evening session was in the continuity of the first one. Great match from both…even with the wind. Fed’s serves were as chiselled as the Corneille alexandrines I had just listened to … In the programme of the play which I watched it was written it was a “subtle, smart and irresistible comedy” . The tennis we had last night was in the same pattern : subtle, smart, irresistible…
We wish the same for tonight, please ! Good luck champion !
Thanks.
2am in the UK which is bad enough but even worse for you in Europe!
@Elizabeth,Chung was good of course but Cuevas was absolutely hopeless,so bad it was almost as if he was
throwing the match which I am quite sure he was not.
The Fed match is at two o clock in the morning UK time,perhaps even later as there is a WTA before it.So I won’t be watching regrettably.To all of you who can watch at a more amenable time,here’s to a great match and another victory(hopefully,)Put that in to avoid hubris 🙂
Cuevas only started playing down match point 😀 saved 10 of them.
Glad you mentioned the difference of Roger getting a bit into most of Chardy’s games where Chardy hardly had a look at Fed’s. Otherwise, everything everybody’s said – I only got to see a bit of the end, but was pleased to see some hustle & angles from both. Highlight shot almost like an exhibition point. As somebody said, almost too bad Chardy couldn’t win the point after all that – but look at Fed’s anticipation, he just had to wait, see if the tweener makes it, he has plenty of time to figure out what he’s going to do with it if it does… and then he puts it back gently out of reach.
Not sure what to expect with Chung – kid seems to have a lot of upside. Hope Roger is able to improve his 1st serve % a bit. Hope it’s a good match. Probably won’t know results till the morning. I do want Roger to win this – locking in #1 I think takes pressure off him to play Miami, if there’s any doubt remaining. Ok, I really want to see him play clay, and the less he plays now the likelier I think that is. Not the whole season, just RG really, which probably means Rome as well as a tune-up. He’s said he’s not playing Monaco since there’s a conflict with his trip to Africa. Anyway we’ll have plenty of time to discuss all that later. Allez “Rodge”!
I dunno why fans want clay really, hasn’t Paganini said multiple times it’s not great for his knee after the operation?!
I also cannot understand this insane yearning of Fed Fans to play on clay.In his youth he was a great clay court player but now enough is enough.You learn to pick your battles,or at least the battlefields to play them on.
I still don’t understand, and I think I’ve brought this question up before. Why is clay bad for the knees? From what I’ve heard, clay lovers say it’s the best for the knees. So, what’s the truth?
Sid I think it’s something to do with the points being a lot longer on clay. In his youth, it wasn’t a problem but since 2016 it obviously is – the courts are so much slower and it’s hard for him to finish points quicker like he does and save his knee more since the operation
There’s an article about it with Paganini. I can’t remember his exact reasoning but it’s basically horses for courses.
Chardy BH is almost as bad as some nameless Americans… and his ball control is so lacking at key times, hence why he hasn’t won more.
Why do so many think Chung will win? Yes it will be tougher but Fed has much too much game! His ability to flatten out the ball will help hugely. Pablo had so much spin on everything that Chung had time on most shots. Plus Chung serve still not huge.
Fed in straights
I agree.
Just watching the Coric /Anderson slugfest.My God is it boring.
Coric finally slugs it out in the tiebreak.
@Sid,
Well Nadal is always moaning about his knees,but they don’t stop him being the King of clay,so perhaps it is one of life’s great mysteries.I still think Fed should avoid the pesky stuff and stick to nice green grass.
They’re showing the US Open 2015 final. You know the one that Roger literally blew up? *facepalm*