Wimbledon men’s quarterfinal: Roger Federer vs. Ivo Karlovic
Roger Federer is just three matches from history – a sixth Wimbledon title and a record 15th Grand Slam championship.
And it would seem that the world No. 2 would have little trouble with his quarterfinal opponent on Wednesday, Croatia’s Ivo Karlovic. After all, Federer leads the all-time matchups 8-1 and is a big betting favorite on WagerWeb.com. These two have played twice this season, both Federer wins in straight sets.
They have played once on grass against each other, that coming in 2004 at Wimbledon, a straight-set Federer victory.
But Karlovic can present big-time problems because he is 6-foot-1 and has one of the biggest serves in tennis. He had 137 aces in the first four rounds (a whopping 41 more than anyone else) and is seeded 22nd at this tournament despite being No. 36 in the world because he is a good grass-court player.
“I like those sort of challenges,” said Federer. “It’s maybe not the most fun match to go through but I like to beat this guy because he makes it hard on us to beat him. He’s become an excellent player. Not only just his serve, he’s got to have something more otherwise he wouldn’t be ranked where he is and he wouldn’t be beating all those good players. He’s not to be underestimated.”
Karlovic set the ATP record of 55 aces in his loss to Lleyton Hewitt at the 2009 French Open. He produced 46 aces in blowing away No. 9 seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and another 35 in beating No. 7 seed Fernando Verdasco so far at Wimbledon. He has yet to be broken on serve in this tournament. Against Verdasco, the Croatian did not even face a break point throughout the entire match. Karlovic is winning 91 percent of the points when his first serve is in.
“What’s impressive about him is that he knows how to hit all the serves, and all the angles,” Tsonga said, “but not all the spins because he doesn’t need them when he serves 130 miles an hour on his first ball and 115 on the second.”
Of course, only one person has beaten Federer at the All England Club in the past six years, and that’s Rafael Nadal in last year’s final. Karlovic, meanwhile, had gone out in the first round at the last four Wimbledons.
Federer has yet to drop a set so far in the tournament, and he enters off a fairly easy win over French Open runner up Robin Soderling in the fourth round.
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