Roddick will face Federer without pressure in Shanghai
SHANGHAI, China (AP) - For once, Andy Roddick will be able to play Roger Federer with no pressure — assuming, of course, he can put that 1-14 record against the top-ranked player out of his mind.
The fifth-ranked Roddick was nearly untouchable Wednesday as he jumped on No. 7 Fernando Gonzalez early, taking a 6-1, 6-4 victory that clinched a semifinal spot at the season-ending Masters Cup.
Trying to defending his title in the event that features the top eight men's singles players, Federer is trying to rebound from an opening round-robin loss to Gonzalez that extended his losing streak to two — the first time in 4 1/2 years that he dropped back-to-back matches.
Federer started a new winning streak by beating No. 4 Nikolay Davydenko 6-4, 6-3 to level his record at 1-1 and set up a Friday match with Roddick. Federer and Gonzalez are both in the running for the second semifinal spot from their Red Group.
In the Gold Group, second-ranked Rafael Nadal (1-1) will try to reach the semifinals when he plays Thursday against No. 3 Novak Djokovic, who is 0-2 and has been eliminated. David Ferrer (2-0) will meet Richard Gasquet (1-1).
Roddick committed only seven unforced errors and never faced a break point. He lost only 11 points in nine service games.
"You have good days where everything feels pretty clean, and this was one of those," Roddick said.
The American, who will lead the U.S. team in the Davis Cup final against Russia at the end of the month, was a question mark coming into Shanghai. But it looks like the time Roddick had to take off to deal with injury may be paying benefits. While a lot of the players are admittedly tired heading into tennis' brief offseason, he has looked fresh and better with each match.
"I feel good," Roddick said. "I'm happy to be here."
With no pressure to win — except for the rest of the field cheering for him to beat Federer — Roddick figures he will be loose.
"There's no reason for me to be nervous," Roddick said. "I can go out there and let it fly. The way I see it ... I can just go out there and play and go for my shots and play aggressive and try to knock him out."
Roddick ran off the first five games against Gonzalez, his confidence rising with each winner. And Gonzalez was nowhere near as sharp as he was in beating Federer two nights earlier. Even his luck was bad. At one point, he had a lunging backhand that caught the net and barely dribbled over. But Roddick was in position to volley and tapped the ball back into the open court for a winner.
"I didn't really feel good in the beginning," said Gonzalez, adding that his legs were tired and felt heavy. "After, it was too late. And Andy plays really good."
With his own strong fan support that included a number of U.S. flags and four women who waved cutout letters spelling "A-N-D-Y," Roddick finished off the match with a strong forehand cross-court that Gonzalez weakly hit short of the net.
Despite a few glitches along the way, including 39 unforced errors to just 23 winners, Federer looked extremely focused as he improved to 11-0 against Davydenko. He was happy he got a chance to regain his touch in Shanghai instead of needing to wait until January to try to break the brief losing streak.
"I realized he was not going to serve bombs all the way through, which allowed me to really get into the rallies from the baseline and try to maneuver him around a little bit," Federer said. "I thought I missed a few too many backhands maybe at the beginning, but then started to slice nicely."
He also realized that Davydenko, who has said he is exhausted after a heavy schedule, wasn't at the top of his game, so he tried to extend rallies until the Russian made a mistake.
"That was the right play today," Federer said.
Federer, going for winners but sometimes missing badly, quickly converted his first break point and served for the set at 5-3 only to see Davydenko break back. But Davydenko's errors handed the set to Federer when he doubled-faulted at deuce, then missed a forehand wide.
Federer cut his mistakes and had Davydenko in constant trouble in the second set. He ran off four games in a row to take command at 5-1. Davydenko got back one break, but Federer was just too good in the end.
Playing mostly from the baseline, Davydenko just didn't have enough to hurt Federer, compiling only 11 winners. He said he was "really tired ... mentally and physically" and will head to the Maldives for a couple days of rest before preparing for the Davis Cup final.
