Novak Djokovic to face Roger Federer in last match of season

“I’m just disappointed that I lost the last two matches”. But there was a little hiccup at the O2 Arena on the way to the Sunday championship final – a loss to a guy named Federer. The French Open champion had been dispatched in straight sets by Federer in their last meeting at the US Open while the ignominy of having never beaten the former world number one on a hard court highlighted the scale of the task facing Wawrinka.

Federer said courtside after beating his compatriot Stan Wawrinka nearly as easily in the evening as Djokovic had dismissed Nadal in the afternoon: “He’s had a tremendous year”. His wife, Mirka, also taunted Wawrinka late in the third set.

Novak Djokovic is back in the final of the season-ending ATP finals. He doesn’t plan to be a no-show this year. I wanted him to feel like he doesn’t know where the next ball was going to go.

Nadal tried just about everything to stay in the match, even hitting a “tweener” in the last game. I’m sure I’m going to leave it all out on the court here.

When a tournament of this prestige is left with four of the top five players in the world, No1 Novak Djokovic, No3 Roger Federer, No4 Stan Wawrinka and No5 Rafael Nadal, it can count itself very fortunate.

Another win over Djokovic Sunday won’t add to Federer’s Grand Slam total, but it could give him a huge momentum boost heading toward the Australian Open in 2016. Even though Nadal tallied more games Saturday, it seemed less close.

“With the best will in the world, this is the seventh one of these he’s been at but it’s his first Davis Cup final”.

The 17-time Grand Slam singles champion is 34 years old now, but he’s the only player on the planet who’s given Djokovic trouble this season.

He broke for the second time, crucially, to win the match after outlasting Nadal in a back-and-forth tussle. He is 9-0 in sets in 2015. “When somebody’s doing like this, just the only thing I can do is congratulate him and just wish not the best of luck for the next year!”

Nadal, however, will probably leave London in good spirits.

Wawrinka wilted to hand the set to Federer, and his hopes of reaching a first ever final at the season-ending tour finals looked all-but over by the start of the second. If he wins the tournament today, for the fourth year in a row, he will have claimed 11 titles in the season, which would beat his haul from 2011.

Hopefully we will also be spared a few of the histrionics that accompanied the semi-final previous year – but our pick is Federer in three. “So, yeah, I still believe his confidence is slightly higher than mine with the amount of success he’s had this year”.

Murray is not too concerned about his form ahead of the clash in Ghent, where he will play his first match on Friday, nearly certainly against Belgian number two Steve Darcis.

There was a lot at stake for Murray as he simply had to beat Wawrinka to confirm his place in the semi-finals.