Roger Federer won his first ATP title since Halle last year and his biggest title since winning the Masters 1000 event in Cincinnati in 2012.  Federer’s win has set up the first Masters 1000 event of 2014 in Indian Wells next week rather marvellously.  Here are my thoughts on Saturday’s final and the tournament as a whole.

Poll Result: 77% of readers went for Federer to beat Berdych in yesterday’s poll for the Dubai final

Dubai Final: Federer d. Berdych, 3-6 6-4 6-3

Roger Federer

This was one of the few matches I watched from Dubai and it certainly wasn’t a classic in terms of quality.  Federer was well off his game in the first set and a half.  The way he turned the match around though was very impressive and it seemed to come down to the serve.  Federer won just 31% of second serve points in the first set and even less in the second set at 17%.  He wasn’t broken though in the decider, staving off three break points and winning 67% of second serve points.  Berdych on the whole was more consistent early on and was up a set and a break.  The match kind of went away from him and the heavily pro-Federer crowd certainly seemed to get to him a little as Federer raced through the final couple of games of the second set with his classiest spell of the entire match.  There were some intriguing moments in the decider, but once Federer held his serve to back up the break, he rather comfortably brought home the bacon.

Federer has made a fine start to the year, but will remain at world number eight.  It will be very interesting to see how Federer gets on at Indian Wells because he goes in as one of the form players.  Avoiding Rafael Nadal will be on top on his draw wishlist.  This was another strong showing from Berdych who has gone 14-3 through the 2014 season.  He has done a really good job in beating the players he has been expected to beat, but I remain unconvinced about his ability to perform his best tennis in the big matches.

Other Highlights:

The one match that will be remembered from this tournament was Federer’s semi-final win over Novak Djokovic.  It was a huge win for Federer, a first over Djokovic since the 2012 Cincinnati final and the first ever time he had come from a set down in a best of three set match to defeat Djokovic.  The Serb has made an indifferent start to the year when you look at the terrific form he displayed in finishing the 2013 season.  Jo-Wilfried Tsonga fell in the quarters to Berdych with a rather lacklustre display.  On the whole, he has made a reasonable start to the year, but has yet to find his spark in big matches.  In 2014, he has lost in straight sets to Federer (Australian Open, R4), Marin Cilic (Rotterdam, R2), Ernests Gulbis (F) and Berdych (QF).

Best match of the week:

Federer d. Djokovic, 3-6 6-3 6-2 (SF)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iobv0Ab5l9g

Moo’s Original Predictions: Overall a pretty good tournament despite losing my champion, Djokovic in the semi-finals.  I correctly predicted 5 out of 8 quarter-finalists with 65% correct picks.