World no. 2 Roger Federer proved again that the next generation of tennis stars are not yet ready to rule the courts. Federer downed Australia’s Bernard Tomic 6-4, 7-6, 6-1 in the third round of the Australian Open.
Earlier in the week, Novak Djokovic soundly beat another young lion of tennis in Ryan Harrison and Federer followed suit with his dismantling of 43rd ranked Tomic.
Lleyton Hewitt summed it up, "Credit Bernard for asking the questions; but Roger was up for it tonight. He answered them all."
The match started out close as Tomic put on a display of his power and variety of shots. Federer went on the attack and played good defense along with timely serving producing easy points for the 31-year-old Swiss champion.
Federer lost only eight points on his first serve as Tomic started to lose focus. The 17 time Grand Slam holder rolled off a series of winners as Tomic could not keep pace.
Tomic had it right when he said, "Then I was, 'Oh, crap, it's Roger.' I try to block out who's on the other side of the net but couldn't quite do it…”
The turning point came in the second set tiebreaker when Tomic was leading 4-1 when Federer came storming back and took over the match.
"I've seen and felt myself playing before so many times that I feel I didn't come up with a shot that I never hit before in my life,'' Federer said, "But we had some great ones, and I had to be able to bring the whole repertoire, I guess, to the court today, defense and offense, which I enjoy.''
Federer has reached the fourth round in the Australian Open for the 12th straight year and will next take on 13th seed Milos Raonic from Canada.
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