Roger Federer fought back from two sets down to progress into the fourth round of Wimbledon with a 4-6, 6-7, 6-2, 7-6, 6-1 victory over France’s Julien Benneteau.
The Swiss avoided number two seed Rafael Nadal’s fate a day earlier, after his shock exit, by showing great mental strengths to fight back after losing the opening two sets to the buccaneer Frenchman.
“Bit of luck in my side maybe. I fought till the very end. I tried in the third, fourth and fifth just to stay alive - in the fourth it was so close,” Federer said.
“Julien was playing amazingly. When you’re down two sets to love you have to stay calm even though it’s hard because people are freaking out. You obviously don’t have many lives left out there and you just try to play tough and focus point to point.”
Benneteau added: “Mentally he’s a rock. He’s two sets down and he doesn’t show anything.”
Meanwhile, eighth seed Janko Tipsarevic headlined a number of casualties, including Nicolas Almagro, Juan Monaco, Fernando Verdasco and Milos Raonic, while Novak Djokovic defeated 28th seed Radek Stepanek in four sets.
In the women’s, number one seed Maria Sharapova accounted for Hsieh Su-Wei in straight sets, while Kim Clijsters got past 12th seed Vera Zvonareva who ended up retiring. Number three seed Agnieszka Radwanska also knocked off local hope Heather Watson.