Andy Roddick had hoped to make Roger Federer wait for another Grand Slam tournament to win his record 15th singles title.

But despite playing what looked very much like the match of his life on Sunday, Roddick could only succeed in delaying Federer’s celebration on Centre Court.

On and on the fifth set stretched, further than any fifth set has ever stretched in a Grand Slam singles final. But in the end, Federer’s phenomenal serving was just a bit better than Roddick’s phenomenal serving.

Cruel as the idea began to seem, the match had to finish. When it did with a forehand mishit error from Roddick, Federer roared and walked to the net all alone in the history books after breaking his tie with Pete Sampras, who is now second on the career list with 14 major singles titles.

“Sorry Pete; I tried to hold him off,” said Roddick to Sampras, who was sitting in the front row of the royal box after flying in from Los Angeles on Sunday morning.

Sampras certainly got his money’s worth for the trip as Federer held off Roddick by the unprecedented score of 5-7 7-6 (6) 7-6 (5) 3-6 16-14.

Federer, who has now won Wimbledon six times, served a personal record 50 aces in a match that took 4 hours 16 minutes. But Roddick was, on balance, the more successful server: holding 37 times in a row before finally being broken in the last game.

‘Unbelievable moment’

“It was a crazy match with an unbelievable end, and my head is still spinning,” Federer said in his post-match remarks to the Centre Court crowd. “But it’s an unbelievable moment in my career.”

... contd.