20131028delpoThere were records, of sorts, to be broken.

This year, Nadal still has an outside shot of winning six Masters 1000 titles if he can win Paris.  This would break the record that he and Djokovic share of five Masters 1000 titles.  However, it’s surprisingly rare to win 4 ATP 500 events.  Indeed, with del Potro’s win over Federer, he has won four ATP 500 events for the first time in ATP history.  His titles include Rotterdam (where he beat Federer), Washington DC, Tokyo, and now, Basel.

Federer, despite his loss, also set a record by becoming the first player to reach ten finals at the same tournament.  Alas, his win-loss record at his home-country tournament is only 50% having won only 5 of those 10 titles.

With Federer in seeming free-fall, but still teetering on the edge of qualifying for the year-end championships in London, the big question was whether Federer could compete against del Potro who is knocking on the door of the top 4.

del Potro has taken his time to reach back to the top of the rankings.  After 2011, his first full year back after surgery in 2010, he was just outside the top ten, and last year, he was just inside the top ten, this year was the push to be more relevant.

Two weeks ago, he decimated Nadal at Shanghai in a match of unbridled power.  del Potro has always had the kind of controlled power that you feel he could trust.  Unlike a player like Ryan Harrison who has to hit big, hit or miss, you feel del Potro’s bazooka forehand is something reliable.

To reach the finals, Federer beat two upstarts in his first meeting with Grigor Dimitrov, a match that looked like it would go 3 sets, but Federer clamped down to win in 2, and Vasek Pospisil, who has reached the top 30 with his third semifinal of the year (he reached the semis of Bogota, as well as Montreal).

The first set went the way of the Argentine with del Potro breaking in the middle of the set, then was broken back.  The set went to a tiebreak which del Potro firmly controlled.

The second set was all Federer as he broke twice to take a 6-2 set, signalling, perhaps that the Swiss maestro was back.

However, the third set swung on a break of Federer’s serve early on.  Federer had chances to break right back, but del Potro showed the other part of his game that is starting to hum in 2013, namely, his mental game.

That early break was enough for del Potro to win the set.  Despite the loss, Federer looked more solid off the ground than he has been in some time, which suggests that with a big break coming up, he’ll be aiming to get the practice he claimed he lacked during the year.

The Basel crowd was certainly appreciative of all Federer has done for Switzerland and gave him a standing ovation for several minutes, as del Potro clapped along.

In Valencia, David Ferrer, defending champ, lost to Mikhail Youzhny in straight sets.  Ferrer has been as productive as ever reaching finals, despite a slump around the US Open, but last year, he won the majority of finals he was in (7 of 8) while this year, he’s only won 2 of 8, and those two were at the start of the year.  He’s lost in back-to-back finals against Dimitrov and against Youzhny.

Next week: Paris, the last Masters 1000 of the season.