Federer, Murray, Roddick and Haas Advanced to the Semis

Roger had very little trouble getting past 6'10" Karlovic

Roger Federer made pretty quick work of Ivo Karlovic in the quarterfinals at Wimbledon making it 21 straight grand slam trips to the semifinals.  In straight sets, Federer broke serve twice on the usually dominant service juggernaut, Karlovic.  Until he met Roger today, Karlovic had a tournament record 157 aces coming into the quarterfinal matchup with the world No.2 player in the world.  Karlovic seemed bothered by the bright sunshine and wore sunglasses through the second set before becoming frustrated with Federer’s flawless play, tossing a sunglasses on the ground after Federer held serve to bring the second set to 5-5.  The set settled at 6-6 and began the first and only tiebreaker of the match.  Karlovic didn’t dominate like many thought he would on his own service game and Federer took advantage of some predictable placement by the Croatian, almost reading his mind and returning tough after tough serve and looking brilliant doing it.  Then, the five-time Wimbledon champion started to get into a groove.  This is the way that Federer likes to play.  He prefers to keep a certain pace and systematically dissect his opponent’s game plan. In a match featuring short points and few rallies, Federer conjured up a few great returns to break the 6-foot-10 Croat twice and secure a 6-3, 7-5, 7-6 (3) victory on another sunbaked day at the All England Club.

Haas upsets Novak Djokovic

In other quarterfinal action today, the 24th-seeded Tommy Haas saved three straight set points against Novak Djokovic after going down 6-3 in the second-set tiebreak. He broke in the fourth game of the fourth set and sealed the win when Djokovic netted a forehand return on the first match point.

The result wasn’t a complete surprise: 54 ranked Haas beat the fourth ranked Djokovic in the grass-court final at Halle, Germany, last month.

Haas led Federer two sets to love in the fourth round of the French Open, only to lose in five. He said he hopes to make amends on Friday.

“That would be nice,” he said. “I’ll give it my best shot. There’s not much he [Federer] can’t do. He’s obviously the favorite to win the title. I’m going to go out there and try to annoy him a little bit and see what happens.” Haas is 31 years old and could very well be the comeback player of the year.  Lleyton Hewitt, also a leading candidate for comeback player of the year is a former No.1 player in the world, and has had an extraordinary year. Haas and Hewitt are both playing great tennis.  Tommy still has a chance to make a huge splash in history if he’s able to beat Roger Federer and go on to play the semi final winner in the upper bracket, the winner in the battle of the Andy’s.  Andy Roddick will square off against the Great Britain hope, Andy Murray of Scotland.  Should be a fascinating match and will surely have a lively crowd cheering Murray hopefully on to a Wimbledon final against either Federer or Tommy Hass.

Murray keeps Great Britain hoping

The third-seeded Murray swept Juan Carlos Ferrero 7-5, 6-3, 6-2 to reach his first Wimbledon semifinal and keep up his bid to become the first British player to win the men’s title since Fred Perry in 1936.

Murray will face the sixth-seeded Roddick, who served 43 aces and outlasted 2002 champion Lleyton Hewitt 6-3, 6-7 (10), 7-6 (1), 4-6, 6-4 in the day’s most competitive match. Hewitt battled back from two sets to one down, before Roddick broke for 5-4 in the fifth and then served out the match — which ended after 3 hours, 50 minutes when the Australian popped up a forehand half-volley past the baseline.

“It’s a testament to the type of player he is that he kept going and made it such a fight,” said the 26-year-old Roddick, who lost to Federer in the 2004 and ‘05 Wimbledon finals. “I think there’s a lot of respect there. We used to get into it a little bit when we were younger, but I think we definitely earned each other’s respect. Now we’re just a couple of old married dudes, so maybe we’ve grown up a little bit.”

Hewitt, who had 21 aces himself, said he did all that he could to deal with Roddick’s rocket serves.

“You know you’re going to get aced a lot,” he said. “I knew that going into the match. You’re going to get some break points and you’re going to see them go pretty quickly as well. It was a matter of trying to hang in there as much as possible and make him play that extra shot. I was nearly able to do it.”

Murray broke Ferrero five times, served 18 aces and lost serve only once. Murray had 49 winners, compared to 20 for the Spaniard, a former No. 1 and only the third wild card to reach the Wimbledon quarters.

It was a dominant performance by Murray, the first Brit to reach the semifinals since Tim Henman did it for the fourth time in 2002.

“I feel confident because I’ve won a lot of matches on the grass,” Murray said. “But every day, when I get up to play the matches, I know that I’m going to have to perform very well, and that gets the nerves and the adrenaline going and makes me play better.”

Andy Roddick has hopes of their time charm in Wimby final but Murray stands in the way.