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Fitting finale to Wimbledon

Author: Sir David Smith
Date: 07/07/2009

It may have been a Wimbledon of hot temperatures, blue skies and never-ending sunshine but at least some parts of the two-week tournament were typical.

Roger Federer won his 15th Grand Slam title by beating Andy Roddick in the men's final and one of the Williams sisters, this time Serena, prevailed in the women's event.

The superb Swiss champion is already the sportsbook favourite to win next month's US Open and, with Rafael Nadal currently struggling to recover from a knee injury, few would bet against him clinching a 16th Grand Slam at Flushing Meadow.

Only one British man and one woman reached the second round of their respective competitions to a widespread gnashing of teeth with Elena Baltacha then crashing out against someone she was expected to beat.

Scotland's Andy Murray looked the real deal, thrashing the likes of Viktor Troicki and Juan Carlos Ferrero as well as winning an epic five-set thriller, this time against Stanilas Warwinka.

To revive memories of Tim Henman, the 22-year-old raised domestic hopes of finally reaching the Final only to come up against a man in the last four in Roddick who was playing his best tennis for years.

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The American showed his four-set victory against Murray was no fluke by taking Federer all the way in an epic final before eventually running out of steam and losing his serve for the first time in the match in the 77th game.

The Final and the Murray v Warwinka matches were the highlights of the men's draw, the latter game being the only one to be played under the new Centre Court roof even though it was a glorious evening.

A shower earlier in the day had persuaded the organisers to introduce their new multi-million pound toy and it turned out to the be the right decision as the roof ensured the match could finish at 10.30pm.

The women's event was a largely mundane affair with the embarrassing semi-final demolition of supposedly world number one Dinara Safina by Venus Williams emphasising the paucity of talent currently on offer.

The early exit of former champion Maria Sharapova did little to help the competition with most of the headlines being taken by the excessive grunting of the players rather than their actual tennis.

The one genuinely enthralling match was the semi-final between the eventual champion and Elena Dementieva, a match that ebbed and flowed superbly.

The Russian had a match point of her own before eventually succumbing to her more powerful and determined opponent.

It was one of the best recent Wimbledons though with two worthy champions, but surely rain will return to the event next year and the roof can finally get a proper introduction.

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