"Shall I try to come over? Shall I chip? Shall I play aggressive? Shall I play short? Shall I play long? I had a lot of things in mind and I decided to return aggressive in the beginning and many times I didn’t quite make many returns," Federer said afterward. "And when I did have the opportunity I was in two minds. So, that is not something that is going to work very well. But at least I was mixing the return and that was the only positive to take out of the first set. I wasn’t just trying to make the returns and just not making them, at least I was trying to go for it which is a good thing."
Federer converted three of 12 break points in the match and will face Yen-Hsun Lu in the quarterfinals, continuing his quest for a record-extending seventh Halle title.
Varying his aggression, angles and return positioning at the right times is vital to Federer's success at Wimbledon, where the return has let him down in recent losses. Federer made good on just one of eight break points in his second-round Wimbledon loss to 116th-ranked Sergiy Stakhovsky last year. In the 2011 Wimbledon quarterfinals, Federer broke Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the Frenchman's opening service game, then never got a sniff at another break point in losing a two-set lead for the first time in his Grand Slam career.
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Lining Up
When Casey Dellacqua dropped the first set to Aussie Fed Cup teammate Samantha Stosur today in Birmingham, she called for coach Shannon Nettle, who told her, "when you hit your backhand crosscourt, step into it and let it go."
Dellacqua did a pretty good job letting her forehand fly as well. Knowing Stosur tends to shade toward her backhand side to hit her favored forehand, the left-handed Dellacqua began ripping her forehand down the line, rallying for a 2-6, 6-2, 6-2 win to advance to her first quarterfinal since Indian Wells.
Ranked No. 209 after the 2013 U.S. Open, Dellacqua has risen to No. 43—her highest ranking since the 2008 U.S. Open and four spots from her career-high rank of No. 39.
Watch Dellacqua work the forehand down the line starting at 2:50 into the video here:
See Friday’s Order of Play at Queen’s Club here, at Halle here, and at Birmingham here.