Relieved Federer admits to riding his luck

"I think I've been unlucky enough this already this season, so I needed one lucky match," said Federer after his 5‑7, 4‑6, 6‑4, 7‑6 (7-1), 6‑0 victory over unheralded Colombian Alejandro Falla. "We'll see how important it is, depending on the run I go on now. I've lost a few matches this season with match points, 7‑5 or 7‑6 in the third, so this is definitely the kind of a match I needed. You can't win them all when they're that close, because they're being played on a couple of points here or there.

"One thing for sure you can do is push the luck on your side - that's not something I've been doing enough the last few months. I'm happy today I gave myself a chance. Maybe some think I should have never put myself in that position…"

That position was two sets down and 0-40 on his own service, and then again a break down in a fourth set that saw him serve up four double faults. "It was like at Halle (where he lost in the final to Lleyton Hewitt), I didn't serve at my best. I had four or five good (service) games then one bad one, and you can't have that," said Federer - always more candid and detailed in his mother tongue once conferences switched to Swiss German.

"It put me under extreme pressure and I have to say that in training, I missed out on working on my service and I need to look at it. I said that I was unlucky, but double faults are my own fault.
I also need to be better on break points and returning in general," said the world No.2 as he picked the same holes in his game that the left-handed Falla had exploited for the first two hours of their contest.

"By the fourth, I started to pick his serve much better, which has always been the case every time I played him, but today for some reason, I wasn't able to read his serve. That really rattled me, I had to look for that for a long time. Thank God I found it eventually. You try something - it doesn't work. You try something else, that doesn't work either, and you need to hold your own service in the meantime and then try something else out so the frustration builds up.

"I needed to be better on break points as, on grass, chances can pass you by really quickly. I've never been the person with the best conversion rate but usually the one at the end of the year who created the most break chances. I tried to vary my returns and at least get them all in but I couldn't."

As is always the case, Federer accentuated the positives. "I was able to go get the victory - he didn't just donate it to me and that makes me feel good, because at the end I did play a great fifth set. Nobody will talk about that, I know - people will say he was tired, he choked already way before," said the Swiss with a wry grin.

"I did play a great fifth set. I was able to read his serve, I was starting to play great with my backhand and things were really clicking in the end. I was lucky but these things balance themselves out, over the year, over a career."

The reigning champion will no doubt be looking to "push the luck on his side" by doing the hard yards on the training courts over the coming days. On the agenda, serving and returning...