He did not play Madrid and lost in the final of Montreal to Scotland’s Andy Murray, who advanced to the Paris Masters semifinals with a 7-6 (9-7), 3-6, 6-3 win Friday over Frenchman Richard Gasquet.
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The 6-foot-10 Isner entered the match 1-5 lifetime against the third-seeded Federer, who was coming off a title in his native Switzerland last week, but used 27 aces off his powerful serve to knock off Federer 7-6(3), 3-6, 7-6(5).
Murray will play David Ferrer for a place in the final on Saturday after the Spaniard beat John Isner 6-3 6-7 (6-8) 6-2. The Swiss raised his level to earn his first break points of the contest in the fourth game and converted his fifth as Djokovic volleyed long to get back on serve.
The other semifinal in Paris will be settled later today, as Tomas Berdych battles with Novak Djokovic, and Rafael Nadal takes on Stan Wawrinka in quarterfinal action.
Andy Murray surged into the Paris Masters quarter-finals with a 6-1 6-0 thumping of Belgian David Goffin in what was a dress rehearsal for their expected meeting in the Davis Cup final.
Djokovic, the first man with four Bercy titles and also the first to win three in succession, was in another league against a sorry Murray, the second seed.
The deciding set again saw serves on top with Federer failing to convert a rare break point at 3-3.
In typically tenacious fashion Ferrer got straight back down to business and raced to a 3-1 lead in the second set.
An early service break proved decisive in the first set and Djokovic seemed poised to put his foot down in the second set as he went up 2-0.
In an incredibly successful season, he had already become the first player to reach 14 consecutive Tour finals in a calendar year and the win over Murray has extended his winning run overall to 22 matches. In the first-set tie-break, Isner fired a forehand victor to move ahead 3/1 before serving it out. “But I just managed to hang in at the end after losing the momentum really in the second set”.
“I definitely didn’t want to go into the third set”. Murray will have gained a lot of confidence from that opener as he was playing the big points better than his opponent.
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Wawrinka received a huge roar from the Paris crowd after holding to love with a volley at the net, but a thrilling third set never happened.
