Federer loses focus but no big shocks

Roger Federer dropped a set and it didn’t rain on Wimbledon Day 5. The rain had been forecast, the dropped set had not.
At the start of the day, the weather forecast had predicted a 40% chance of heavy rain. But few people would have expected Philipp Kohlschreiber to get anything from his match against Federer given that he had lost in straight sets to the Swiss in three previous meetings.

There was not a drop of rain but Kohlschreiber gave Federer a contest 6-3, 6-2, 6-7 (5-7), 6-1.

“I thought the rhythm was very high. We played a lot of tough points. I really thought from my side it was an excellent match,” Federer said.

“You also need the opponent to come up also with the goods to make it an exciting match, and I thought it was. Sure, I would have loved to win in straight sets, but he came back strong.

“Maybe my serve let go just a little bit. But he started to pick side a lot as well and took the right decisions at the right time and deserved the third set in the end.”

This was Federer’s 15th successive victory, his longest winning streak since the summer of 2007 when he won 18 matches in a row. He will break his personal record if he wins Wimbledon, as if he needed more motivation.

So another beautiful day at the 2009 Championships spelled another round of routine victories for the majority of seeds, including Serena Williams, Novak Djokovic and Elena Dementieva.

Williams and Dementieva were particularly impressive in their wins. Williams hit 10 aces and more than twice as many winners as Roberta Vinci in her 6-3, 6-4 win. Regina Kulikova made three times more errors than Dementieva, which explains the 6-1, 6-2 scoreline in the fourth seed’s favour.

The only defeats of note were ninth seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and 15th seed Tommy Robredo in the men’s draw and Marion Bartoli, the 12th seed and 2007 finalist, and 15th seed Dominika Cibulkova in the ladies’. The ladies’ seventh seed Vera Zvonareva withdrew because of injury.

Gisela Dulko, the woman who upset former champion Maria Sharpova in the previous round, was beaten in three sets by 10th seed Nadia Petrova.

Federer refuses to speculate about possible opponents, but if he did he would have an eye on both Djokovic and Ivo Karlovic, who beat Tsonga in four sets.

Djokovic, the fourth seed, produced a competent 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 victory over Mardy Fish. “Today I performed the best match so far in Wimbledon, which is really encouraging for continuation of the tournament. The more matches I play, match after match I play better, which is always a positive fact.”

Karlovic beat Tsonga by virtue of his huge serve. The tallest player on the ATP Tour served 46 aces in his 7-6 (7-5), 6-7 (5-7), 7-5, 7-6 (7-5) win and did not give the Frenchman a break point opportunity all match. However, it was not until the 38th game of the match that Karlovic converted his only break point of the match. Plenty for Federer to think about.