Sometimes those big victories resonate in the mind more.  Tomas Berdych beat Novak Djokovic in the semifinals of Wimbledon to reach his first final.  People forget that Berdych and Djokovic met twice more that year with Djokovic winning both encounters (Davis Cup and the round robin at the ATP World Tour Finals).

Much like Wawrinka over Roddick, Berdych had made short work of Fernando Verdasco, hitting him off the court.  But that match was two powers hitters with one of them feeling it more that day.  Djokovic hits plenty hard, but he has so much more.  He’s a better mover, a better returner, and his serve which had been giving him issues last year had returned back to form.

It also hasn’t hurt Djokovic that the weather has not been as traditionally hot.  In any case, this match was played at night under a roof.

Djokovic’s strategy was to move the big man around, and use his size against him.  In particular, he would either hit a series of inside out forehands to Berdych’s backhand or a series of crosscourt forehands to Berdych’s forehand.  Each time, Berdych would recover to the center, and then be pushed back into the corner until Djokovic would connect on a good corner shot or Berydch would overhit a shot.

The first set ended quickly with a double break 6-1.  In the second set, Berdych took an early break but wasn’t able to maintain as Djokovic broke back.  Djokovic had an early lead in the tiebreak and then won going away.  The third set was similarly lopsided.

The ESPN announcers felt, despite the lopsided score, that Berdych continued to play with effort, unlike Wawrinka, but that Djokovic was hitting more solidly throughout.

This was a surprising match for me.  I didn’t expect Djokovic to win so easily.  Where I thought Federer might be able to handle Wawrinka because he generally plays the quarterfinals very well and because Wawrinka had played more passive players in Roddick and Monfils, I felt Berdych could hit with Djokovic.

Credit Djokovic and his team with devising a game plan using his returning skills and pinpoint placement and move Berydch around, hitting behind him, and using Berydch’s size against him.

Up next for Djokovic is Roger Federer.  Both will get Wednesday and Thursday off and play on Friday.

It’s hard to say who has the edge.  Federer started playing much better tennis than he had in his previous two rounds.  Djokovic, on the other hand, has been playing well throughout, and now has a win over a top ten player.  Last year, Federer beat Djokovic numerous times, but lost the big one in the US Open semifinals.  In particular, he beat Djokovic at Toronto, in Basel, in Shanghai, then in the semifinals at London in the year-end championship.  That’s a pretty solid edge.

But, all the players have an off-season and they use it to recover and prepare for the next season.  Djokovic’s was shorter than most since he had to play Davis Cup and then there were celebrations afterwards.  However, he credits his team with giving him a tidy schedule where he could focus on tennis and not get too distracted with personal obligations.

I give Djokovic a fair chance to pull the upset, but clearly, winning the first set will be huge for both players.  I think Federer still needs to up his game.  Wawrinka is good, but Djokovic is better.  And, this time, Djokovic and Federer come into the semifinals pretty fresh.  Federer was pushed early by Simon, but had a straight set win over Malisse to recover.  He dropped a set to Malisse, but had a comfortable win over Wawrinka.

Djokovic has only dropped one set so far.  But he didn’t have to play a full match against Troicki.  Last year, he was down two sets to one to Tsonga and lost in five sets.

Tonight, Nadal plays Ferrer and Murray plays Dolgopolov.  Ferrer has beaten Nadal a few times, but Nadal has dominated this rivalry.  Ferrer’s strategy of playing inside out to a righty’s forehand doesn’t work against Nadal and Nadal can take neutral balls and hit it for winners.  Ferrer is playing very good tennis, and I think he might be able to push Nadal some. but Ferrer’s not had tough opponents.  He’s primarily played up-and-comers in Richard Berankis and Milos Raonic.  These two may eventually become very good players, but at this point, Ferrer is still far better than either one.

Nadal will be highly favored to beat Ferrer.  The one advantage Ferrer has is his mobility.  Cilic may hit the ball hard, but he’s not del Potro.  He may move well, but he’s not Ferrer.

The tougher match, in my mind, is Murray’s match against Dolgopolov.  It might help that this match will be played later in the day in slower conditions.  Murray has, so far, played the most dominant tennis among the top 4 seeds.  He hasn’t dropped a set.  Indeed he’s not even dropped more than 7 games in any of his matches.  Dolgopolov’s strength will be his speed of movement.  He can also move the ball around, a skill he used to dismantle Soderling in the sets he won.  Of course, Murray has something that Soderling: footspeed.

Murray said he had played Dolgopolov way back in 2006 in a Davis Cup match played on clay.  Murray won in straight sets.  Of course, that was a different Murray and this is a different Dolgopolov.  I do think Dolgopolov can push Murray but if Murray is playing like he has, he should be able to reach the semifinals.