8.15am
LONDON - Tim Henman turned the weight of British hope and expectancy to his advantage as he outfought an angry Mark Philippoussis 6-2 7-5 6-7 7-6 on Monday to reach the Wimbledon tennis championships quarterfinals for the eighth time.
The British number one produced an inspired performance to blunt the power
of the big-serving Australian in just over three hours.
Henman barely put a foot wrong in the opening set as he secured a double break before sealing it with half volley winner.
However, the fifth seed won the second in controversial circumstances after breaking Philippoussis in the 11th game with a lob, which appeared to drop wide.
Philippoussis tried his best to make an impact on the Henman serve in the third set but he was left extremely frustrated with the amount of close calls going against him.
The Australian lost his cool at 6-5 up in the third set after the umpire failed to declare a Henman serve long and was handed a warning for audible obscenity.
A charged up Philippoussis steamed through the tiebreak 7-3 but, having saved two match points on his serve in the eighth game of the fourth set, he eventually surrendered in the breaker after sailing a backhand wide.
Henman will next face Croatian Mario Ancic as he bids to reach the Wimbledon semifinals for the fifth time.
Former champion Lleyton Hewitt dropped his first set and first service games of the tournament at Wimbledon tennis championships on Monday on the way to a 6-4 6-2 4-6 7-6 win over claycourt specialist Carlos Moya.
The two breaks in the third set and one in the fourth, proved mere hiccups in the seventh seed's determined progress to the quarterfinals but he will need to play better to beat his next opponent, top seed and defending champion Roger Federer.
"I look forward to the challenge ahead but I have to raise the level of my game," Hewitt said. "Roger's capable of playing exceptional tennis he has an all-court game".
Hewitt, who suffered a humiliating first-round exit last year after winning in 2002, strode into the second week with easy victories over Juergen Melzer and Irakli Labadze before sending an emotional Goran Ivanisevic into retirement in the third round.
"I learned a lot from last year's loss and I'd like to think I'm a better player because of it," the Australian said.
Hewitt's ranking has dropped after illness in 2003 affected his form and he decided to cut back on the number of tournaments he played. He is now ranked 10 in the world.
Moya, the 1998 French Open champion, was always going to prove a tough prospect after winning three titles so far this year at Chennai, Acapulco and Rome.
The pair, who both prefer to hit form the baseline, traded ferocious groundstrokes, but Hewitt's penetrating serve gave him the edge particularly in the first two sets.
He broke the Spanish ninth seed in the 10th game of the first set for a comfortable lead and looked to be cruising after breaking twice in the second.
The 27-year-old Moya was far too experienced to allow his 23-year-old opponent an uninterrupted ride, however.
He took advantage of an early lapse in the third set to break immediately, piling the pressure on Hewitt with telling passes and some deft drop shots.
Hewitt broke back but succumbed again in the 10th game, peppering his game with errors and looking fragile for the first time in the tournament.
"I expected a tough match even though grass isn't his favourite surface," Hewitt said.
Moya kept it tough to the end but a tiebreak proved a step too far on the grass for the man from Mallorca. Hewitt attacked the Spaniard's serve, producing volley and smash winners for minibreaks before Moya netted on the second match point to hand him victory.
Roger Federer remains the player everyone in men's tennis looks up to.
Croatian cloud-tickler Ivo Karlovic, a 2.08m serving colossus, went the same way as the Swiss defending champion's last 20 grasscourt opponents on Monday, losing 6-3 7-6 7-6 in the fourth round.
Before the match, all the talk was of how Federer would handle a Karlovic serve that had mustered 95 aces in three matches on his way to the fourth round.
The champion found it faintly amusing.
"We will see how big that serve is," he said before the match with the supreme self-confidence of a man who knows he is the best all-round player in the world.
In fact, one Federer serving statistic was far more telling. He had not lost his serve once in the tournament and, incredibly, the Swiss he can barely remember when he last did.
"What do you mean?" he replied when asked on Monday. "The French Open (in May), no? It was in Halle (two weeks ago) ... in the maybe second, third round. I don't know."
Unlike Federer, Karlovic had been broken four times before Monday's game. It quickly became five on Monday when the Swiss angled a forehand service return winner past the human pylon from Zagreb at 3-2 in the first set.
Federer, arguably playing even better than last year, suffered the indignity of facing two break points of his own in the next game.
After saving them with customary elan, he wrapped up the set and contented himself with tiebreak successes to take the next two sets, confirming victory with a gorgeous crosscourt forehand pass.
"It's always good playing tiebreaks. I haven't played one yet (at Wimbledon)," Federer remarked, mindful of harder battles to come with 2002 champion Lleyton Hewitt his next opponent.
On grass, Federer is so good it can actually be boring. Usually, though, just when his audience is starting to tire of another inevitable victory procession, the Swiss jolts the senses with a moment of inspiration.
On Monday it came at 3-3 in the second set. Until then on cruise control, Federer scampered full tilt cross court to retrieve what looked a certain Karlovic winner and somehow flipped the most delicate of backhand winners down the line.
Asked to describe how he had felt facing the serve of the tallest man on the tour, Federer did his best to sound perturbed.
"It's definitely different," he said. "It's a different angle it's coming from. You're not used to it. It's a nice experience, I have to say.
"The pulse is higher. That's the scary thing about playing guys like this. You know if you get broken there is a very big chance you are going to lose the set ... That makes the pulse go up, a little bit.
"It's nice for a change."
Second seed Andy Roddick silenced the booming serve of Alexander Popp 7-5 6-4 6-4 on Monday to take his place in the quarterfinals.
German Popp, who reached the last eight on his only two other Wimbledon appearances in 2000 and 2003, was beaten by the American's opportunism in a tight court one tussle.
Roddick sneaked the first set and, after brave resistance from Popp at 4-5 in the second, broke again to go two-love up.
Errors began to pepper both players' game in the third set but the 21-year-old US Open champion was always in front, sealing victory with thundering forehand pass. Roddick faces Dutch 12th seed Sjeng Schalken in the quarterfinals.
Results of men's singles matches (prefix denotes seeding):
Fourth round
* 2-Andy Roddick (US) beat Alexander Popp (Germany) 7-5 6-4 6-4
12-Sjeng Schalken (Netherlands) beat 30-Vincent Spadea (US) 6-2 7-5 3-6 6-2
7-Lleyton Hewitt (Australia) beat 9-Carlos Moya (Spain) 6-4 6-2 4-6 7-6 (7-3)
Mario Ancic (Croatia) beat Xavier Malisse (Belgium) 7-5 3-1 - retired
1-Roger Federer (Switzerland) beat Ivo Karlovic (Croatia) 6-3 7-6 (7-3) 7-6 (7-5)
Florian Mayer (Germany) beat Joachim Johansson (Sweden) 6-3 6-7 (5-7) 7-6 (7-5) 6-4
10-Sebastien Grosjean (France) beat 27-Robby Ginepri (US) 6-2 6-2 7-6 (7-4)
- REUTERS
Related information and links
8.15am
LONDON - Tim Henman turned the weight of British hope and expectancy to his advantage as he outfought an angry Mark Philippoussis 6-2 7-5 6-7 7-6 on Monday to reach the Wimbledon tennis championships quarterfinals for the eighth time.
The British number one produced an inspired performance to blunt the power
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