Mardy Fish beats boyhood buddy Andy Roddick, will play Roger Federer for Cincinnati title

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Fish, Federer advance to Cincinnati final

MASON, Ohio — A seven-minute rain delay saved Mardy Fish.

Fish turned the brief break in the second set into a rallying point Saturday. Only one game away from a straight-set defeat, he pulled out 4-6, 7-6 (3), 6-1 victory over boyhood friend and high school teammate Andy Roddick in an all-American semifinal at the Cincinnati Masters.

Fish will play second-ranked Roger Federer for the title. Federer beat unseeded Marcos Baghdatis 6-4, 6-3 in an evening semifinal that lasted only 70 minutes.

Fish advanced by regrouping during the match’s third rain delay, one so brief that it shouldn’t seem to matter. Roddick led 5-2 in the second set when the players slung their equipment bags over their shoulders and headed to the locker room, then got called right back.

“It wasn’t long at all,” Fish said. “It was only a couple minutes that we were back there, so I just changed (outfits). It was only a couple of minutes.”

Time enough to change everything.

The start of the match was delayed 50 minutes by heavy rain. Another cloudburst during the first set resulted in a 1-hour delay that knocked Fish off his game. Roddick was up 5-4 coming out of the delay. Fish developed trouble with his forehand, dumping three into the net while Roddick won the game and the set.

Fish trailed 5-2 in the second set when another shower forced that brief break that had the opposite effect.

“The first one really helped, the second one obviously didn’t,” Roddick said. “That’s the thing with rain delays. The momentum can shift really fast.”

Fish knew he was in deep trouble when he came back on the court.

“You don’t want to be in that spot at all,” Fish said. “I was just lucky to get out of it.”

This time, Fish was better when they got back. He broke Roddick’s serve for the first time in the match to keep it going, then won the tiebreaker when Roddick began missing routine shots. Roddick fell behind 3-0 in the third set, becoming so upset with himself that he swatted a ball away and bounced his racket off the ground.

Roddick faded at the end, showing little emotion while Fish finished him off.

It was a good week overall for the two good buddies.

Roddick came to the $2.4 million Western & Southern Financial Group Masters hoping to get in condition to contend for the U.S. Open title. He pulled out of Toronto last week, unsure why he was feeling sluggish this summer. A blood test found he’d been fighting off a mild case of mononucleosis the last couple months.

The top-ranked American felt revived in Cincinnati. He considered it a “complete positive” to reach the semifinals and play his friend.

“I feel OK,” Roddick said. “You know, to be honest, I came here and I had no expectations. For me to get in five really tough matches is more than I could’ve asked for going into the Open. Honestly, when I came here I was thinking maybe two matches and we’ll see. I hadn’t really put too much time in.”

Roddick and Fish know what the other is about to do on the court, a bond that goes back to their boyhood. Fish lived with Roddick’s family in Boca Raton, Fla., in 1999. They went to the same high school, played on the tennis and basketball teams together, and practiced against one another nearly every day.

They remain close while competing against each other. Roddick has gotten the best of it — he had a 9-2 advantage in their career series coming in, though Fish won the last one in Atlanta on July 24.

Fish has played some of his best tennis lately, winning back-to-back titles in Newport and Atlanta while putting together a 16-1 streak.

“I’ve never felt better on the court and I’ve never been more confident and I’ve never played better,” Fish said. “So I kept that in the back of my head, that I’ve won a lot of matches this summer.”

He’ll face a player who was hardly played all week.

Federer was on court for only 28 minutes in his opening match before Denis Istomin hurt his ankle and had to quit. Federer advanced without leaving the locker room before his next scheduled match — Philipp Kohlschreiber dropped out because of a sore shoulder.

He’s in the final despite playing fewer than five sets all week.

“I got kind of lucky in this tournament,” Federer said. “I hardly had to play the first two matches. Things are working out for me here.”

Federer was sharp in his semifinal win, never facing a break point. He broke Baghdatis to close out the first set, then again to go ahead 5-3 in the second. Federer will be trying to win the Cincinnati title for the fourth time — he also was the champion in 2005, 2007 and 2009.

Federer is 5-1 against Fish, though the American won 6-3, 6-2 when they last played in the semifinals at Indian Wells in 2008.