Dubai Duty Free Men's Open:
26 February - 04 March 2007

After a week-off missing Rotterdam, Soderling was in Dubai in one of the highest-profiled tournaments outside the Masters Series. The opening round opponent was the Spaniard David Ferrer. Soderling had a 3-0 lead in h2h, winning on all three surfaces, including last year on clay in Bastad.
He was expected to do well today and he did so, winning in straight sets. But it came with a fight. In the opening set he found himself a break behind at 1-4, before breaking back eventually. The set went to a tiebreak, without any more breakpoints. In the tiebreak, Soderling was twice ahead, but was unable to capitalize and the first set-point was for Ferrer. It was saved, as were many more to come, before Soderling finally put it out for a 15-13 win - the biggest of his career in ATP.
Ferrer was shaken visibly by the loss and immediately fell behind in the second set. Robin just applied more and more pressure to finally win it for less than 25 minutes (after the hour and a quarter first set).

The match with Hrbaty from the second round started uneventfully, as a single break, midway through the first set gave soderling the lead. He broke immediately again in the second set, as Dominik made two double-faults in a single game. He managed to go thorough the set saving a few break-points, but was not able to win a single more point off the Slovak's serve. A multiple-deuce game at 4-3 was finally won by Robin to move him one game away from victory. But Hrbaty finally broke-back in the very final moment to level at 5-5. Soderling had to step-up his game and he did so, as he got to 0-40 lead in the very next game, to score the vital break, before easily serving out the match on the second attempt.

The quarterfinal began well for Soderling against the veteran Santoro. Quickly the result went to 5-0 and the set was soon over at 6-1. He took an early advantage in the second as well, but this time the Frenchman broke back to level at 3-3. Robin had few break-points to break again right in the next game, but wasn't able to convert them and then he had to save some on his own. But the set went to tiebreak, where there was only Santoro on court, taking it 7-2.
Soderling called for a medical time-out right afterwards and it did him only good, as he broke right in the start of the final set. At 2-0 he faced few breakpoints, but then afterwards he had no problems at all as Santoro's game was falling apart. In less than half an hour it was over with a 6-0 set.

"I started off the match really, really well and played some great tennis", he said. "Santoro makes you play bad, and he made me play bad today.
"I was up a break in the second set and all of a sudden I lost it 7-6, but I pulled myself together and won the final set 6-0.
"Against an opponent like Fabrice who plays like no other on the tour it's really important to stay focused all the time. It's a tough game to play."
next opponent will be Rafael Nadal or Mikhail Youzhny:
"I think I have to think I can otherwise there is no point in going on the court", Soderling insisted. "Obviously two great players; Rafa, everyone knows his results and Youzhny has just won in Rotterdam and is in great shape. It's going to be a tough one for sure."

And Youzhny really proved to be in better shape, as he won convincingly in the Semifinal. Now Robin has not got to a single final this season (worst season so far in that term since 2003), although he has three semifinals. But in the match with the Russian Soderling was not able to even put a respective fight. He had two breakpoints at 15-go 5-3 up in the opening set and losing them was the point he lost the whole match. He held breakpoints in the very next game, but was unable to save at 5-5. Then he lost serve again right in the start of the second set and was never in position to start a fight back through the whole set. In fact in the second set, Soderling won just three points off Youzhny's serve.

“He played much better than me,” said Robin. “He didn’t miss much, and from the end of the first set and in the second he was a lot better. I had some chances at 4-3 in the first set, but after that it was not really close.”
"Today I didn't feel like I could have done anything different. Of course I could have done everything a little bit better. I didn't play well today, but he played really good. If I had played my best match who knows if it would have been enough anyway. But he was too good today; from the end of the first set and throughout the second set, he was too good."

But Soderling got the most off the favorable draw as he could and also good preparation for the two hardcourt Masters Series events that come next.

The Dubai Tennis Championships Dubai, UAE Surface: Hard Status: International Series Gold Prize Money: $1,500,000 Draw Size: 32 Winner: (1)Roger Federer Finalist: Mikhail Youzhny Robin Soderling this year: Semifinal Lost to Mikhail Youzhny Defending Champion: (2)Rafael Nadal Last Year's finalist: (1)Roger Federer Robin Soderling last year: Not Played Seeded players: 1. Roger Federer 2. Rafael Nadal 3. Nikolay Davydenko 4. Tommy Robredo 5. Tommy Haas 6. Tomas Berdych 7. Novak Djokovic 8. David Ferrer cut: Kristian Pless - 86

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