WIMBLEDON, England — Out of the mouths of so many professional athletes it would have sounded insufferably arrogant.
But uttered by Roger Federer on the grounds of the All England club, where the five-time Wimbledon champion has not lost a match since 2002, it simply made sense. And the only appropriate response, after pondering the audacious claim for a moment, was to nod in agreement.
“I’ll have a chance to win this tournament for the next five or 10 years, you know,” the 26-year-old Federer said after breezing into Wimbledon’s semifinals with a 6-1, 7-5, 6-4 dismissal of the hard-serving Mario Ancic on Wednesday. “There will always be tough opponents, dangerous opponents. That has been the case for the last years. But I found a way to win always.”
Not long after Federer secured his semifinal berth, Spain’s Rafael Nadal joined him, crushing Scottish hopeful Andy Murray, 6-3, 6-2, 6-4, with a masterful display of athleticism and guile.
The ease and efficiency of the respective routs affirmed the vast gulf that separates the talent of Federer and Nadal from the rest of the world’s tennis players. But there is one more round to go before the Swiss and the Spaniard would meet again on Wimbledon’s Centre Court, in a dream final that so many want to see on Sunday.
Federer must first vanquish the strapping Marat Safin, himself a former world No. 1, whose talent has long done battle with a tortured soul. Safin noted the irony of regaining his form here on Wimbledon’s lawn, having famously groused years ago that “grass is for cows.”
But Wimbledon has represented a renaissance for Safin, 28, who advanced to Friday’s semifinals by defeating his fourth consecutive seeded opponent, Feliciano Lopez, 3-6, 7-5, 7-6 (7-1), 6-3.
The only certainty about Nadal’s next opponent is that he’ll be unseeded, at least 30 years old and woefully outmatched. The remaining quarterfinal pitting Germany’s Rainer Schuettler, 32, against Arnaud Clement, 30, was suspended for darkness with the score knotted at one set each. It will be resumed today, depriving whichever veteran wins from a full day’s rest before facing the tireless Nadal on Friday. That doesn’t bode well.
After eight successive days of glorious weather, Wimbledon finally reverted to form Wednesday. The rain came, and plenty of it, delaying the start of play an hour. Only 27 minutes of tennis was staged before rain returned, halting the action until late afternoon.
But 27 minutes was more than enough for Federer to declare his mastery of grass anew and squash any notion Ancic might have had about repeating his 2002 upset of Federer on the same Centre Court.
The Swiss champion was in full command during his opening set against Ancic, which lasted just 20 minutes. Federer lost only one point on his serve in the set and hit 15 winners to Ancic’s three.
It wasn’t that Ancic was slow-footed, and he surely didn’t lack focus. Federer was simply playing at a level so ethereal that no shot Ancic managed to produce — whether service return, groundstroke or volley — was good enough.
“He makes you play the hardest you can,” said Ancic, 24, from Croatia. “You have to go for your shots. And, on the other hand, you’re not allowed to miss if you want to win. Every point had to be perfectly done.”
Ancic raised his level after the rain delay. But as in poker, Federer raised his game higher. He was rewarded with a sheet of match statistics that warranted a gold star from his coach: 15 aces and no double-faults; 40 winners and six unforced errors.
Federer, of course, has no coach. Only he, it seems, understands his genius.
“Today I was in complete control,” Federer said. “I was never really under pressure. … This is obviously a perfect situation.”
It was Federer’s 64th consecutive victory on grass. He is the only player in the men’s draw who has yet to lose a set.
If Federer glided majestically past his opponent, Nadal ground his to a pulp.
Murray, who has inherited the burden of one day reclaiming Wimbledon’s championship for Britain, had never felt more heroic than he did Monday, after roaring back from a two-sets-to-none deficit to upset eight-seeded Richard Gasquet. The British tabloids proclaimed him “Braveheart” the next morning, a nod to his fierce Scottish pride.
But after being pummeled by Nadal for nearly two hours, Murray trudged off a beaten man.
“He played so much better than me,” said Murray, 21. “His forehand was ridiculous. He’s hitting the ball so close to the line, so hard, that it was difficult to get into a rhythm.”
Nadal was pounding the ball so hard that it might have been more prudent to forget about rhythm and simply duck.
The partisan crowd cheered Murray on, working hard to keep in spirits up in the face of the Spaniard’s onslaught. But even the most ardent Murray fan had to concede that the deserving player won.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
