Roger Federer reached his first French Open quarterfinal in four years on Sunday, with the third seed easing past Leonardo Mayer to reach the last eight in Paris.
The Swiss had cruised through his first three matches at Roland Garros, returning to the tournament have skipping it the past three years, and though this match could have been his toughest so far, the 2009 champion had little trouble today.
Mayer is an experience clay courter, but had revealed he was struggling physically following his third round win, and was not able to get close to Federer today, with the third seed prevailing 6-2, 6-3, 6-3 in just an hour and 42 minutes.
Federer breezes through
It was the perfect start for Federer, breaking in the opening game, and the Swiss consolidated for a 2-0 lead. Mayer had forced the third seed to deuce in that game, but that was the closest he got to his opponent on serve, and was being completely run ragged as he was broken once again for 4-1. He was able to serve to stay in the set successfully, but Federer easily took the first set 6-2 in less than 30 minutes.
Federer started the second set quickly, breaking in the opening game, and looked solid on serve as he was repeatedly able to keep his advantage. Mayer, after losing serve early on, looked more competitive in this set and applied a little pressure when the Swiss was serving at 4-3, though Federer held, and converted a second set point when the Argentine was serving down 3-5 to take a two set lead.
Mayer provided one or two challenges to Federer early on, but was not really able to threaten the Swiss, though the third seed did miss a couple of chances to break when leading at 2-1. However, Federer was able to break in Mayer’s next service game and consolidated for a 5-2 lead. The Argentine forced him to serve it out, but another easy hold saw him progress.
Having lost in the fourth round in his past two Grand Slam tournaments, Federer will likely be thrilled to have made it to the last eight without facing too much trouble at all. He could face a very tricky match next though, against either Stefanos Tsitsipas, who beat him in the Australian Open, or Stan Wawrinka, who beat him in the last eight here in 2015.