History beckons for Federer as he faces Cilic in final
ROGER Federer was challenged for the first time at Wimbledon before defeating Tomas Berdych to reach his 11th final.
The 35-year-old still has not dropped a set but he survived several tense moments on his way to a 7-6 (7/4) 7-6 (7/4) 6-4 victory.
Federer will face Marin Cilic on Sunday, after the Croat beat Scott Querrey 6-7 (6/8) 6-4 7-6 (7/3) 7-5, bidding to win a record eighth title at the All England Club and to become the oldest men’s singles Wimbledon champion of the open era.
He will go into the match as the hot favourite but there were slight glimmers of hope for Croatian Cilic in this performance that Berdych was unable to capitalise on.
Arguably no-one has suffered more from the big four’s dominance than the Czech, who has reached seven grand slam semi-finals and one final – which he lost to Rafael Nadal here seven years ago.
On that occasion he defeated Federer and Novak Djokovic back to back and, having benefited from the Serbian’s retirement on Wednesday, he was looking to repeat the feat.
Berdych repeatedly targeted the Federer forehand and had a decent amount of success, while he showed an unexpected deftness of touch at the net.
But too often he made bad errors at important moments while Federer slipped up only once when shutting the door in his opponent’s face.
The writing was on the wall for Berdych at two sets down and the third set was Federer at his best.
He broke the Berdych serve for the second time to lead 4-3 having snuffed out two chances for his opponent with unreturnable serving.
And after two hours and 18 minutes, Federer booked his place in the final when Berdych netted a backhand.
It will be a staggering 29th grand slam final for the Swiss, who, just short of his 36th birthday, will be the oldest man to appear in the Wimbledon men’s final since the 39-year-old Ken Rosewall in 1974.
Cilic’s victory was closer than the score suggests.
Querrey snatched the first set and very nearly took it to a fifth only for the Croatian to break at the crucial moment to seal victory after two hours and 56 minutes.