It’s probably been a few years since Andy Roddick had a serious shot at winning a Slam. Roddick’s always done well when he starts with a new coach, and then the relationship stales. It happened with Gilbert, Connors, even briefly with Patrick McEnroe, and Larry Stefanki. A few months after working with Stefanki, Roddick made the 2009 Wimbledon finals where he pushed Federer to a 16-14 final set where Roddick lost serve only once, but lost the one that mattered.
When Roddick started, he had his serve and a big forehand. He may have been inconsistent, but those two shots were bombs. Since then, he’s changed his game to play a steadier style, but his forehand no longer wins him free points.
Even so, he made the semis of Queen’s and had to be feeling good against Feliciano Lopez. Sure, Lopez is a dangerous player with a huge lefty serve and big forehand, basically a Verdasco-lite. Lopez is often more noted for swooning female fans rather than the quality of his tennis. He’s a solid top 40 player, but mostly slices off the backhand, and comes to net where he can use his net skills.
In 7 meetings, Roddick had won all 7 including a meeting at Queen’s which admittedly, went 3 sets and two tiebreaks. Indeed, most of their matches have had at least one tiebreak. The story with Lopez was that he couldn’t close out matches.
Today was different. Lopez bombed in 28 aces. Roddick claims he has rediscovered his serving motion and is now hitting more aces, but it was his return game that got him in trouble. Lopez took the first two sets in tiebreaks. He played remarkably steady from the baseline, hitting off-pace shots just to keep the rally going and looking for chances to get to net. Roddick just couldn’t find ways to break Lopez so when Lopez had his one break, it was only a matter of time before Lopez would serve it out.
Roddick had hoped to better his fourth round exit, but is now out of the tournament in the third round.
David Ferrer was down 2 sets to 1 to upstart Ryan Harrison, but Ferrer has been in this situation before. He’s beaten Tomic and Raonic, two other upstarts. Up a break when their match was called due to darkness, Ferrer came back to claim the fourth set. Harrison was then broken to give Ferrer a 2-0 lead in the fifth when Harrison then found himself at 0-40 and eventually lost serve again. He would lose serve one more time to give Ferrer the fifth set relatively easily.
Bernard Tomic of Australia had his hands full against Igor Andreev who had won the first two sets. Tomic had the third set, and their match had also been called last night. However, Tomic continue to win games and eventually took the fifth set, 6-1.
Jurgen Melzer had his hands full with the suddenly resurgent Dmitry Tursunov who the UNICEF Open in the Netherlands last week. Melzer needed to win tiebreaks in sets 3 and 4 to close out this match.
Richard Gasquet continues to show that grass, not class, is one of his best surfaces with a convincing win over Simone Bolleli in straight sets.
The other Andy, Andy Murray would have his hands full against the Croatian veteran, Ivan Ljubicic. As matches were being called for rain, Murray again played a match under the roof. Ljubicic isn’t the fastest player, but he has a pretty big forehand and backhand and a decent serve. Murray took the first set, 6-4, and Ljubicic returned the favor in the second set 6-4. Murray then took the third set, 6-1, and was up 5-4 serving for the match when Ljubicic played a good return game to break. They held until the tiebreak where Murray kept ahead enough to win 7-4.
Murray faces another challenge in the fourth round. Murray had a big breakthrough in his game in 2008 when he beat Gasquet in the fourth round. Gasquet won the first two sets, but Murray came back in 5, flexing his biceps. Murray found himself in a similar situation against Gasquet in 2010, in the first round of the French Open, down 2 sets to none and recovered. Perhaps playing Ljubicic is good for Murray since Gasquet also has a big backhand, although Gasquet moves better than Ljubicic and arguably his backhand is even better.
Rafael Nadal had a tough first set against the last player not named Federer to beat Rafa at Wimbledon, namely, Gilles Muller. The two went to a first set tiebreak which Nadal won 8 points to 6. One imagines a day of rest and planning will give Nadal the edge he needs to win this quickly, but Muller has surprised by keeping so close.
Juan Martin del Potro had to play a lengthy first set against Gilles Simon. He won the tiebreak, 10 points to 8, but Simon is up a break, 4-2 in the second set when the match was called due to rain.
Tomas Berdych who continues to sneak through the draw has won 2 sets and is up 4-3 in the third against Alex Bogomolov, Jr. This match will also be conclude tomorrow.
Gael Monfils and Lukasz Kubot, normally a doubles specialist, have split sets. They are in the third set and will play tomorrow.
Tomorrow, Federer, Djokovic, Nadal, del Potro, Tsonga and Monfils will play. Some are playing full matches while others are resuming their play that was suspended due to rain.
