With Wimbledon approaching, Roger Federer has shown that he could be challenging for honours at SW19 again this year.
The 32-year-old Swiss star captured his seventh Gerry Weber Open title by beating Alejandro Falla in the Halle final at what is one of the more prestigious warm-up tournaments for the third Grand Slam of the year.
The second seed clinched the 14th grass-court title of his career by beating Falla 7-6 7-6 in just under an hour-and-a-half.
Federer has won 46 of his 51 matches at Halle and has now secured 70 tour-level titles but it is an eighth Wimbledon crown that remains his target.
“I really enjoy winning titles. It is what I play for, to play and receive a standing ovation at the end,” said Federer.
“In the past, when I have played well at Halle I have usually played well at Wimbledon. They have been two of my most successful tournaments, so I hope that this title will bring me luck again. Last year it didn’t work out, but it did many times before. So I hope it will be back to the good old days.”
Federer is likely to be one of the favourites in the tennis betting to do well at Wimbledon but there may well be quite a lot of money being put on Grigor Dimitrov. He saved one match point before battling back to beat Feliciano Lopez in the final of the Aegon Championships at Queen’s as he clinched his first ATP World Tour grass-court title.
The Bulgarian has been bracketed in the ‘one to watch’ category for several years but finally seems to be realising his potential as he has now won four ATP World Tour titles.
Since teaming up with coach Roger Rasheed eight months ago, the 23-year-old has won an indoor title in Stockholm, on an outdoor hard court in Acapulco and on clay in Bucharest before his success at Queen’s.
As a result of such a hot run of form, Dimitrov has risen to 13 in the world rankings and he could be one to watch at Wimbledon, although it must be remembered that he has not managed to get past the second round in any of the last three years.
Dimitrov, who reached the quarter-finals of the Australian Open in January, said after beating Lopez: “I’m really happy with the win.
“I just fought hard and left everything out on the court – that was my main goal. I achieved what I was looking for.”
Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and last year’s winner Andy Murray will once again be the men to beat at Wimbledon but Dimitrov has the game to challenge them and will be full of confidence after showing that he can play well on grass.
Polish star Jerzy Janowicz reached the semi-finals 12 months ago and took the first set off Murray before eventually losing in four, and Dimitrov can be this year’s surprise package from Eastern Europe.
