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It’s a repeat of last year’s Wimbledon semi-finals when big-serving Canadian Milos Raonic faces 18-time grand slam champion Roger Federer one stage earlier. Join The Roar for live scores from around 12am – midnight (AEST).
Last year’s semi-final was truly an epic as Raonic upset possibly the greatest ever players, winning a tense five-setter.
Raonic took the first set of that match, but lost the next two. He then was able to survive an unreal amount of pressure to take the fourth 7-5, before moving through to the final 6-3, where he eventually lost to Andy Murray.
The difference though, was that Federer had played a five-setter, coming back from two down to knock out Marin Cilic in the quarter-finals. This time around, Federer is yet to drop a set and has just had a number of months off, so fatigue shouldn’t be an issue.
In their other previous meetings, Federer holds a 9-3 advantage, including their two meetings on grass. Raonic won both of their matches in 2016 though, with the other coming in the final of the Brisbane International. They are yet to meet this year.
Raonic’s biggest weapon is his serve, but it must be consistent against a player like Federer. He has struggled in that element of his game so far.
Holding serve easily is imperative for Raonic to not give any confidence to the Fed Express. The Canadian has struggled to break serve, so his best bet is getting sets to tie-breakers.
He played out a pair of tie-breakers in his first round win over Jan-Lennard Struff, before dropping the first set but bouncing back to win in four against Mikhail Youzhny.
A third round demolition of Albert Ramos-Vinolas was his most convincing performance yet, before he was taken to five sets by German Alexander Zverev, winning the final 6-1.
Federer has had no such problems and will look to put his long rest and less court time at Wimbledon to good use. Alexandr Dolgopolov retired early against him in the first round, before he has marched all over Dusan Lajovic, Mischa Zverev and more impressively Grigor Dimitrov.
Dimitrov, the 15th seed made the semi-finals of the Australian Open earlier this year and lasted almost five hours against Rafael Nadal, so for Federer to serve at a high percentage, win a majority of net points and blast Dimitrov off the court is impressive to say the least.
The winner will advance to the semi-finals of The Championships and face the winner of the quarter-final between Tomas Berdych and Novak Djokovic.
Prediction
Federer will return last year’s result with a positive one and go through to the semi-finals.
Federer in five sets.
Be sure to join The Roar for live scores of this quarter-final from 12am – midnight (AEST) or at the completion of Andy Murray versus Sam Querrey on the centre court and don’t forget to add a comment in the section below.