Dealing well with whipping winds and a familiar opponent, 16-time Grand Slam champion Roger Federer served his way to a 6-4, 6-4, 7-5 victory over fifth-seeded Robin Soderling to reach the U.S. Open semifinals.
"I've been practicing my serve a whole lot, for my whole career. If I can't serve in the wind, I've got a problem, you know?" Federer said. "You could probably wake me up at 2 in the morning, or 4 in the morning, and I could hit a few serves." Federer had an 18-2 edge in aces against Soderling and improved his career mark against the Swede to 13 wins from 14 matches. The lone loss was in their previous match, in this year's French Open quarterfinals. Soderling's victory there ended Federer's streak of reaching the semifinals at a record 23 consecutive major tournaments.
Federer has won 45 of his last 46 matches at Flushing Meadows, the one exception the 2009 final against Juan Martin del Potro. He will now meet third-seeded Novak Djokovic in the semifinals for the third U.S. Open in a row. It's also the fourth consecutive year they'll play each other in New York, dating to the 2007 final, and Federer has won each of those matches.
Wozniacki breezes in to semis
Caroline Wozniacki stayed on course for a return to the U.S. Open final, fighting near gale-force winds and big forehands from diminutive Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia on Wednesday to reach the semi-finals.
Wozniacki breezes in to semis
Caroline Wozniacki stayed on course for a return to the U.S. Open final, fighting near gale-force winds and big forehands from diminutive Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia on Wednesday to reach the semi-finals.
The top-seeded Dane, who breezed through the first four rounds losing just 10 games, navigated the challenges for a 6-2 7-5 victory that set up a semi-finals match with seventh-seeded Russian Vera Zvonareva.