Wimbledon - Day 7 Review
Dudi Sela's Wimbledon campaign is over after he fell to a comprehensive defeat against Novak Djokovic.
Although Sela spurned three break points very early on in the first set which could have built the foundations for the most famous of wins, Serbian Djokovic, the fourth seed showed his class throughout before running out to a 6-2, 6-4, 6-1.
In a match which lasted just under one and a half hours, Sela was broken seven times, and despite once more playing on court three in front of vociferous support, unlike in the previous three rounds, he was unable to produce another stunning performance.
Speaking afterwards, he said: "Nerves did play a part. I think I started very nervous. Also I finished very nervous.
"But he is much better player that all of the guys that I played until today.
I think I had a few chances here and there, but also I didn't play aggressive any chances, tried to make him make the mistake and not go for it."
Sela also spurned a glorious opportunity to break Djokovic's serve early on as he found himself with three break points, but he wasn't able to convert any of them. "That wasn't a devastating moment - not so much. I mean, it was 2-1, I think 0-40, I knew I definitely want to break him and hold my serve, so it's going to help me a lot.
"But he was playing well. He was serving very tough. His second serve is very good, and I didn't expect for that. I had a tough time. I think the main reason that this match was one-sided is the serve. He was serving good. I didn't serve so good. And the second serve, also. For me second serve I gave him a lot of easy balls, so he was dictating the points.
"I felt like I can win this match. He is number four in the world and it's the fourth round which is unbelievable for me. But I wanted to win this match. I believed that I could win this match.
"But unfortunately he played much better today, and he's a very good player and I was nervous and many factors came in."
Djokovic said: "I think I was dominating throughout the whole match. That's what I needed to do. I mean, as I said before, Dudi obviously has a quality reaching the fourth round. Anybody who reaches a fourth round in a Grand Slam is a quality player, and he beat some good players here in this tournament. So you got to give him credit for that.
"But I needed to be focused and I needed to be aggressive and serve well today and try to open the court and get some opportunities to end up the point, which I did. As I said, I was keeping the control of the match, and I needed to do that in order to finish in straight sets."
Later on Monday evening, Andy Ram was vying for a place in the quarter-finals of the men's doubles. However, he and Belarussian Max Mirnyi will have to conclude their match on Tuesday after bad light stopped play at 9:30pm. And up against Simon Aspelin and Paul Hanley, the match is evenly poised at two sets all, and two games all in the fifth and final set. The match will resume second on court three on Tuesday.
