WIMBLEDON, LONDON, ENGLAND Last year’s champion Serena Williams crashed out of Wimbledon, as did sister Venus in a dramatic day’s tennis. World number one Caroline Wozniacki also lost. The men’s event went more to form although Rafa Nadal and Roger Federer each dropped a set before going through to the quarter-finals. Serena Williams went down 6-3 7-6 to France’s Marion Bartoli while Venus fell 6-2 6-3 to Tsvetana Pironkova of Bulgaria.
Andy Murray swept past Richard Gasquet 7-6 6-3 6-2, Rafa Nadal saw off a determined challenge from Juan Martin Del Potro 7-6 3-6 7-6 6-4. Roger Federer started rather slowly and lost the first set tie-break to Mikhail Youzhny but then swept past the Russian, 6-7 6-3 6-3 6-3.
Miami, Florida (GenevaLunch) - Andy Roddick beat giant-killer Tomas Berdych 7-5 6-4 in the final of the Sony Ericsson Miami Masters, Sunday 4 April. The big-serving American ended the Czech’s run of scalps that included Roger Federer, Fernando Verdasco and Robin Soderling. Roddick beat Rafa Nadal in the semi-final.
In the women’s final on Saturday Kim Clijsters crushed an inept Venus Williams 6-2 6-1 in less than an hour. In the semi-finals Clijsters won an epic match against her fellow Belgian come-back queen Justine Henin.
Link: Sony Ericsson Open
Melbourne, Australia (GenevaLunch) - Scotland’s Andy Murray moved into the semi-finals of the Australian Open when last year’s champion Rafael Nadal withdrew in the third set suffering from a recurrence of an injury to his right knee. Murray was already leading the match 6-3, 7-6, 3-0 and looked in awesome form. He will face the Croatian giant Marin Cilic, who beat Andy Roddick in five sets.
Flushing Meadows, New York (GenevaLunch) - Kim Clijsters showed what tennis been missing as she continued her run with a 6-0 0-6 6-4 win over third seed Venus Williams. The chunky Belgian powered her way past the gangly American in the first set but then started to miss and quickly lost the second. The third set was more even but Williams could not recover from an early loss of serve. Clijsters could face Serena Williams in the semi-finals but first needs to get past Chinese player Li Na.
Men’ tennis
Flushing Meadows, New York (GenevaLunch) -The first round of the US Open resulted in a few scares, but no real upsets. Number one seed Roger Federer, in search of his sixth successive title in New York eased past 18 year-old American Devin Britton 6-1 6-3 7-5, dropping serve twice but coming back immediately each time. Andy Roddick, who lost an epic Wimbledon final against Federer this year beat Bjorn Phau 6-1 6-4 6-2.
Federer, who completed a career Grand Slam by winning the French Open in June and set a career record with his 15th Slam title at Wimbledon, became the first player to earn $50 million in career prize money with the victory.
Cincinnati, USA (GenevaLunch) – Spectators at the ATP tournament in Cincinnati were treated to a marathon feast of tennis as the top four men in the world played their second round matches. Roger Federer, Andy Murray, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic all won. Number 5, Andy Roddick, lost to fellow American Sam Querry.
Wimbledon, England (GenevaLunch) – Swiss Roger Federer won an epic match against American Andy Roddick that went to 16-14 in the fifth set. Roddick only lost his service in the final game of the match, which lasted four hours and 16 minutes. The victory broke Pete Sampras’s record of 14 Grand Slam wins. Sampras was in the Royal Box along with other legends Bjorn Borg and Rod Laver, the only male to twice win all four Grand Slam titles in the same year.
Wimbledon, England (GenevaLunch) - The two women’s semi-finals were totally different but ended with the same result: Williams beats Russia. Serena fought back from a set down, and match-point down, to battle past Elena Dementieva 6-7 7-5 8-6 in the best match of the women’s tournament. Dementieva took the first set in the tie-break with precise ground strokes and an improved service. She then lost her first service game but came back to lead the set before Serena came back to take the set. The third set was hard fought with both players rising to the occasion until Serena finally won the longest ever women’s semi, at two hours 49 minutes.
Wimbledon, England (GenevaLunch) - The women’s Wimbledon tennis semi-finals will feature Americans Venus and Serena Williams against two Russians: Dinara Safina and Elena Dementiava.
Wimbledon, UK (GenevaLunch) - Wimbledon had a day off for the “middle Sunday” and has not yet had to test the new roof after an unusual absence of rain. In the mens’ draw the dream final of Roger Federer, in search of a record 15th Grand Slam title, against Andy Murray in search of his first, is looking likely.
