Roger Federer relaxes before raising game to beat Marin Cilic at ATP Finals

Roger Federer is in such a rich vein of form that he is even winning matches he could afford to lose. Thursday’s meeting with Marin Cilic at the O2 Arena was a dead rubber, so when Cilic took the first set, Federer would have had every reason to drop his intensity. Instead, he raised it.

By coming back to claim a 6-7, 6-4, 6-1 victory, Federer maintained his impressive record of only having lost four times all season. He also stayed on track for the potential maximum payout of 1,500 rankings points if he wins all five matches at this tournament. Which would send him into 2018 right on Rafael Nadal’s tail, only 140 points behind.

“I told myself to try to relax a little bit,” Federer told Annabel Croft in his on-court interview. “We have a lot of pressure on us throughout the season, so it was nice to have less pressure and remind myself I am through regardless. Still, I wanted to keep the momentum going.

“Knowing you have qualified on Tuesday evening is kind of weird,” said Federer, who knew he would finish at the top of the Boris Becker Group whatever happened on Thursday, and would thus avoid the other group-winner Grigor Dimitrov in Saturday's semi-finals. “Try to relax now and one more push at the weekend, to finish off a great season.”

Meanwhile, Nadal may have been forced out of this tournament by knee trouble, but he scored a victory on Thursday as well, though his came in a French legal court. This was the outcome of a defamation case that he had brought against Rosalyne Bachelot, the former French health and safety minister, who had claimed last year that Nadal was serving a silent doping ban when he sat out the second half of the 2012 season.

Neither party appeared in person at the trial, but Nadal’s lawyer brought medical evidence that Nadal was unable to play during that period because of his knees, while Bachelot could not support her claim with proof. As a result, she was fined £454 and told to pay £10,700 in legal fees. Her liability could have been higher, but the judge said there were no grounds to believe that her comments – which had been broadcast by the D8 channel in March 2016 – had damaged his relationships with sponsors.

Nadal responded to the verdict in a statement. “When I filed the law suit against Mrs. Bachelot,” he said, “I intended not only to defend my integrity and my image as an athlete, but also the values I have defended all my career. I also wish to avoid any public figure from making insulting or false allegations against an athlete using the media, without any evidence or foundation and to go unpunished. "The motivation as I have always remarked was not economical. The compensation will be paid back in full to an NGO or [charitable] foundation in France."

Finally, Czech police announced that they had abandoned efforts to track down the burglar who slashed the former Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova with a knife last year. "Despite extensive investigation, we have not managed to identify the attacker to date," detective Jan Lisicky told reporters.