LONDON: Sometimes no practice makes perfect for Roger Federer anyway.

After cancelling his training session a day earlier, Federer produced a much-improved performance to get his campaign for a seventh ATP Finals title back on track with a 6-2, 6-3 victory over Dominic Thiem on Tuesday.

Having lost his opening round-robin match to Kei Nishikori, the 20-time Grand Slam champion was still some way from his fluent best but dropped just six points on serve and took advantage of a wayward display from Thiem to break twice in both sets.

“[It] was not about my forehand or my backhand or my serve or anything,” Federer said. “I guess it was my head. For that sometimes you need a break.”

With a 1-1 record in round-robin play, Federer will likely need to defeat Kevin Anderson on Thursday to improve his 14-1 record of reaching the semi-finals at the season-ending tournament.

It will be a repeat of a dramatic Wimbledon quarter-final earlier this season, in which Anderson came from match point down in the third set to win in five on his route to the final.

“I’m happy I’m getting a chance to play him again and have a rematch,” Federer said. “Hopefully I can take my revenge. It was a great match but obviously one that hurt.”

Anderson thrashed Nishikori 6-0, 6-1 earlier Tuesday to move to 2-0, with the lopsided scoreline all but assuring the South African debutant’s place in the last four.

The inspired 32-year-old won the first 11 games but was denied only the second ‘double bagel’ in the event’s 48-year history after Federer’s 2005 rout of Argentina’s Gaston Gaudio.

“It’s amongst the best [matches] I’ve played,” world number six Anderson told reporters. “I did a really good job constantly applying the pressure and not letting up. I felt I did a fantastic job throughout really.”

Former US Open finalist Nishikori was at a loss to explain his performance, saying: “I played one of the worst matches this year. Today was a terrible match.”

Thiem is facing an opening-round exit at the O2 Arena for a third straight season and will need to defeat Nishikori in straight sets to have any chance of progressing.

“I really want to play a good match,” Thiem said. “Doesn’t matter if it’s the last one here or not.”

Published in Dawn, November 15th, 2018