Federer Begins Bid to Regain Title at Dubai Tennis Championships

Dubai, UAE, February 26th, 2007: Roger Federer began his bid to regain the Dubai Tennis Championships title he gave up last year to Rafael Nadal by beating off the solid challenge of Kristian Pless to win 7-6 3-6 6-3.

The enterprising Dane served well and made Federer work hard for his victory, giving up his serve just once in the entire match.

After Federer had swept the tiebreak 7-2, he made a forehand error to drop his serve when down 2-1 in the second set. But he then secured the match with a break of his own when leading 2-1 in the third.

“It was the usual Dubai first round,” said Federer, who often struggles in his opening match in Dubai. The court’s so quick and there’s just no rallies. I just didn’t want to get frustrated, especially as I haven’t been playing for one month.

“The guy played very well. I knew it was going to be tough and I’m just happy I’m through, really. Losing my first set of the year doesn’t matter much. The way I came through, I’m really pleased about it.”

Spanish fourth seed Tommy Robredo was the first seed to drop, falling 7-6 6-4 to 2002 Dubai champion Fabrice Santoro, and Kuwaiti wild card Mohammed Al Ghareeb briefly threatened a major upset when he took the first set from Czech number six seed Tomas Berdych.

Serving and rallying well, he broke to lead 4-2 when Berdych made a forehand error and went on to take the set. After an early exchange of breaks Berdych broke again to lead 5-3 and served out for the second set, before taking control in the third to win 3-6 6-3 6-2.

UAE number one Omar Bahrouzyan found former world number 12 Dominik Hrbaty too hot to handle as he was beaten 6-1 6-2 in the first round of the Dubai Open on Monday.

Ranked 808, Bahrouzyan was always likely to struggle against a vastly more experienced opponent. But it was his serve, rather than any other part of his game, that let him down the most.

Although he rallied quite well, Bahrouzyan hit a total of nine double-faults, with four of them coming at the worst possible time on break points.

Bahrouzyan began well by breaking Hrbaty in the opening game, but then hit two successive double-faults to drop his own serve in the next game. His next service game was a marathon, stretching to deuce seven times, before another double-fault gave Hrbaty another break for 3-1.

Two more successive double-faults then left Hrbaty serving for the set, which he tied up in 30 minutes.

Bahrouzyan settled down more in the second set with just two double-faults, but the last of them gave Hrbaty another break to lead 2-1. Games then went with serve until Bahrouzyan was broken a final time at 4-2, and Hrbaty went on to claim his 56-minute victory.

The Dubai Tennis Championships is owned and organised by Dubai Duty Free and takes place under the patronage of HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai.

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