After squandering two match points against Novak Djokovic for the second consecutive year in the U.S. Open semifinals, 16-time Grand Slam champion Roger Federer says that Djokovic’s forehand service return winner on the Swiss' first match point at 5-3 in the fifth set was “lucky.” Djokovic scalded a cross-court winner on that point, then saw Federer hit a forehand off the net cord that fell wide on his second match point. Federer double faulted to lose the game, lost the next three games, and the match.
"I had it," Federer said after his 6-7 (7), 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 7-5 loss. "There's no more I could do. Snaps one shot, and then the whole thing changes….I didn't hit the best serve. But it's just the way he returns that. To lose against someone like that, it's very disappointing, because you feel like he was mentally out of it already. Just gets the lucky shot at the end, and off you go… Look, some players grow up and play like that. I remember losing junior matches. Just being down 5-2 in the third, and they all just start slapping shots. It all goes in for some reason, because that's the kind of way they grew up playing when they were down. I never played that way. I believe in hard work's gonna pay off kinda thing, because early on maybe I didn't always work at my hardest. So for me, this is very hard to understand how can you play a shot like that on match point. But, look, maybe he's been doing it for 20 years, so for him it was very normal."
Djokovic, who waved his arms after the winner in order to get part of the pro-Federer crowd on his side, said: "That forehand return, I cannot explain you because I don't know how it happened. I read his serve and I was on the ball and I had to hit it hard, and it got in, luckily for me."