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Milos Raonic has defeated Roger Federer to win his first Brisbane International tournament in a brilliant start to his 2016 season.
REPORT: RAONIC WINS BRISBANE INTERNATIONAL
Federer struggled and was never in the game making far too many forced errors and showing a very rusty performance.
There were few moments of brilliance from the world No.2 with Raonic cruising to a straight sets victory and getting a strong lead-in to the upcoming Australian Open.
Final score
Roger Federer 4 4
Milos Raonic 6 6
Can Roger Federer defend his crown or will Milos Raonic turn the tables in a replay of last year’s Brisbane International final? Join The Roar from 8pm (AEDT) for live scores and a blog of the match.
World No.2 Roger Federer will go into the final with every intention to win after the Swiss legend was successful in claiming his first title at Brisbane last year which made for his 1000th career win.
A year on from that historic day, Federer looks just as menacing and runs into the tournament having beaten some quality opposition. He was awarded a first round bye as he is seeded first in the ATP World Tour 250 event and met German Tobias Kamke in the second round who he steam rolled in straight sets 6-2, 6-1.
Grigor Dimitrov met Federer during the quarter-finals and put up a fight winning the second set however he was not good enough in the end to beat the tennis heavyweight going down in three sets 6-4, 6-7, 6-4.
Like Dimitrov, eighth seed Dominic Thiem had the odds stacked against him when meeting Federer in the semi-finals however he used this to his advantage providing quality opposition to Roger despite the scoreline. He couldn’t hold out the reigning champion, and Federer progressed to the final with a 6-1, 6-4 straight sets win.
Roger has won eight of his last ten matches with his only losses coming at the hands of American world No.10 John Isner during the third round of the Paris Masters 6-7, 6-3, 7-6 and to world No.1 Novak Djokovic during the ATP World Tour Final 3-6, 4-6 who he had defeated earlier in the end of year tournament during the round robin stage.
Fourth tournament seed Milos Raonic has also won eight of his past ten matches with his only losses coming at the hands of world No.5 Rafael Nadal during the third round at Shanghai at the back end of 2015 and in Beijing when he lost to Viktor Troicki in the first round.
Like Federer, Raonic had the bye over the first round and began his 2016 season in the second round when he met with Ivan Dodig and after dropping the first set fought back to claim a three-set win 6-7, 6-1, 6-4.
It set him up for a quarter-final match-up with Frenchman Lucas Pouille who tested the Canadian going down in straight sets 6-4, 6-4 after a brilliant tournament from the world No.78.
Raonic yesterday defeated Australian seventh seed Bernard Tomic in straight sets 7-6, 7-6, demonstrating strong play on serve and securing his place in the final against Federer.
The finalists have played each other a total of ten times with Federer winning all bar one of those meetings.
Last year’s Brisbane International final saw Federer come out on top in three sets 6-4, 6-7, 6-4 and was one of two encounters in 2015, the other coming during the semifinals of Indian Wells with Federer claiming a straight sets win 7-5, 6-4.
The pair’s hard court record is 6-1 in favour of Federer.
Prediction
Roger Federer will cap off the Brisbane International with an emphatic win as he prepares for an Australian Open onslaught.
Federer in straight sets.
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