Djokovic, Federer hope to avoid Nadal's fate

Jun 29, 2012 |

Reuters

London

Tags:

Britain_Wimbledon_Tennis_WI.jpg.crop_display.jpg

Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer return to centre stage at Wimbledon on Friday hoping to avoid the fate that befell Rafa Nadal who was sent packing by little known Czech gun-slinger Lukas Rosol.

The two remaining members of tennis's big three will know that whoever reaches this year's final will be an overwhelming favourite given the Mallorcan's battler's shock demise under the Centre Court lights on Thursday.

"It is only a tennis match," was Nadal's philosophical take on being jettisoned in the tournament's second round.

"You win, you lose. Last four months were great for me...."

"You arrive here, and a little bit of everything. You play against an inspired opponent and I am out. That's all. It is not a tragedy."

Djokovic, who faces 28th seeded Czech Radek Stepanek, and Federer, who takes on France's Julien Benneteau, have both looked in imperious form and not dropped a set in their opening two matches.

In the women's draw, world number one Maria Sharapova is back in action after returning on Thursday to finish off Tsvetana Pironkova, and plays Taiwan's Hsieh Su-wei on Court One in her third round clash.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/166128" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd></li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-ad098f327e57750cb70fe3ed013b47d0" value="form-ad098f327e57750cb70fe3ed013b47d0" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="80608085" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>