For the tennis fans amongst you there’s no need to tell you that the ATP World Tour Finals started yesterday, an event featuring the 8 top performing male tennis players this season. This year the event is being hosted for the first time at London’s O2 Arena. With a capacity of 20,000 (Wimbledon’s Centre Court now has a capacity of 15,000) it’s a great a stage for such a prestigious event!

I wasn’t disappointed not to see Murray’s win over Del Potro in the afternoon session because I had tickets to the evening session featuring none other than World No. 1 Roger Federer against World No. 8 Fernando Verdasco!

Hit the link for more detail!

I’ve seen Federer play a couple of times in the past but this was different as he was playing a top ten player and would have to play some good tennis. Against lesser opponents he often never needs to bring his A-game or pull out his best shots… ‘This should be good!’ I thought.

Don’t get me wrong, I really like Verdasco’s style of play. Against almost anybody else I’d be rooting for him… but not against Federer.

Federer proceeds to open the match with one of the worst service games I’ve ever seen - I think the first point was a double fault, actually. For the whole of the first set he could barely get the ball in the court and it was a miracle the score was only 6-4 to Verdasco. I believe he hit 15 unforced errors. 15!

I was in shock… my tennis hero in dire straits. But then he blew aside those cobwebs and really took the game to Verdasco. He started finding his range and returned a lot better, putting a great deal of pressure on the Verdasco service games. Still, it was going with serve and Verdasco was playing well. Damn, those spin shots he hit to Federer’s backhand must have been difficult to deal with. When Federer got the break to take the second set I sighed with relief.

The Fed patiently hit some serves from about 5 feet behind the baseline and bounced up and down to keep loose whilst Verdesco went for a toilet break. The break did nothing to halt Federer’s gaining momentum and within no time at all it was 5-0. Verdasco held serve to get a game in the final set and save some dignity but there was no stopping Federer. Roger really played some stunning tennis and it was a real lesson in how not to get discouraged when you’re playing badly and losing.

What a privilege to see Roger arguably still in his prime - or at least still as No. 1 in the world.