Reporting from Wimbledon, England — The sound of deflation murmured through the grounds at the All England Club today, but the sound of elation came from within one Andy Roddick.
Roddick, the American former No. 1 who had spent recent years teetering toward afterthought status as fresh luminaries such as Andy Murray ascended, had just played one of the matches of his 26-year life in upsetting the No. 3 Murray, 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (7), 7-6 (5), in a stirring men's semifinal.
As a Centre Court crowd still stirred from the closing tiebreaker, Roddick said in an interview with the BBC broadcast through the stadium, "To be honest, the last couple of years I didn't know if I would ever get a chance to play for another Grand Slam title. Now I get to and it's a dream."
It's the No. 6 player who moves to Sunday with the imperious Roger Federer, the five-time champion who pushed through Tommy Haas in the first semifinal, 7-6 (3), 7-6, 6-3, to reach his seventh consecutive Wimbledon final. It's a rematch of the 2004 and 2005 finals, both won by Federer, rather than the untold din that would have sprung from the presence of a first British male finalist in 71 years.
Instead of the Federer-Murray bout people anticipated all along, 71 years of eloquent disappointment since Bunny Austin reached the final in 1938 will stretch to 72, and 73 years since Fred Perry won the title in 1936 will stretch to 74. Instead of Federer trying to solve a home-country player who has beaten Federer four consecutive times, the Swiss will seek his record 15th Grand Slam title against a finalist he has beaten 18 of 20 times, all six times in Grand Slams and three times in Grand Slam finals.
That jarring reality came because Roddick served well, hung in surprisingly on ground stroke exchanges with the crafty Murray and, perhaps most of all, rebuffed the repeated visits from negativity he might have accepted in the past.
He plied his trademark excellence in tiebreakers, raising his record this year to 26-4. His aggression left Murray even more defensive than he prefers, a matter illustrated in the last point of the last, tense tiebreaker, when Roddick sent Murray side-to-side and shipped him all the way off the court into the backhand corner for Murray's last bid.
When that gasp hit the net, Roddick fell to the ground, rose to hold his hand over his baseball cap and looked half-startled, a feeling that had just become commonplace around Wimbledon.
