Andy Roddick retires; James Blake to meet Andy Murray in final at Queen's

Andy Roddick suffered a huge blow after he was forced to retire with an ankle injury during the first set of his Queen's Club semifinal against compatriot James Blake.

He called for treatment three games into the match and resumed after having his ankle and foot heavily bandaged.

However, Roddick was clearly still in some discomfort as he served in the next game and decided to take the safety-first option with Wimbledon starting in just nine days.

Blake, who was a finalist here back in the 2006, admitted he did not take much pleasure from this victory.

"It was unfortunate but Andy is such a great player and he doesn't want to endanger the injury anymore," Blake said.

"He normally moves so well and you could tell this wasn't the same Andy Roddick."

The American will now try to stop Andy Murray who is bidding to become the first Briton to win the pre-Wimbledon warm-up event since 1938.

Earlier, Murray completed a ruthless 6-2, 6-4 win over Juan Carlos Ferrero.

"I felt it was a good match. I started well but the second set was very close," Murray said.

"I'm obviously happy to win in two sets. I was very happy with the way I played all round."

"I didn't have the easiest draw so it's been a good week all around and hopefully I can finish it off on Sunday."

(Via cnn.com; Images by Julian Finney/Getty Images)

It's not the end of clay court dominance for Nadal

Sometimes you just can't have it all.

Rafael Nadal who has just won the Monte Carlo Open and at Barcelona last Sunday, didn't have a chance defend his three straight wins at the Rome Masters after stumbled at the first hurdle when the Spaniard lost 7-5, 6-1 to compatriot Juan Carlos Ferrero yesterday.

I wasn't really disappointed as Nadal has been playing non-stop for the past 2 weeks and defended 2 titles. This is the only second time in his last 104 games that Nadal has lost on clay. Ferrero now meets Andy Murray's conqueror, Stanislas Wawrinka, in the third round.

Ferrero who has never beaten Nadal on clay consistently put Nadal under pressure in the first set and then went on to win over his compatriot in eight encounters and his first on clay.

(Images from AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)