By Pritha Sarkar
LONDON, June 15 - Twelve months after enduring a
miserable season on grass, Andy Roddick has once again found his
groove and believes he could be pushing Roger Federer for the
Wimbledon crown later this month.
The big serving American's thunderbolt serves kept on
misfiring last June and he exited the All England Club in the
third round, his worst showing since 2002.
He is now ready to forget that nightmare and assert his
status as one of the front-runners for the grasscourt grand
slam.
"I kind of put last year aside a little bit just because it
was probably the worst tennis I played in the last four or five
years," Roddick said after reaching the semi-finals at Queen's
Club.
"Every other time on grass I've been right there, you know,
with these tournaments. I lost to Roger three times in the final
weekend.
"You probably put Roger as the favourite and outside of
that, I feel like I'm right there."
The American reached the semis in 2003 and was runner-up the
following two years.
Federer has been unstoppable on the slick surface for the
last four years and is the overwhelming favourite to equal Bjorn
Borg's record of winning five successive titles in southwest
London.
Unfortunately for the American, he has not been able to beat
Federer in almost four years and trails their head-to-heads
13-1.
But he was not going to let that bleak statistic crush his
dream.
"I'd love to win a Wimbledon sometime. I've been so close
before. That's probably my primary goal in my career at this
point."