Kevin Anderson won the longest Centre Court match in history and earned a chance to try to collect his first Grand Slam championship, edging John Isner 7-6 (6), 6-7 (5), 6-7 (9), 6-4, 26-24 at Wimbledon in a marathon between two big servers that lasted more than six-and-a-half hours.
The fifth set alone lasted nearly 3 hours as the semifinal became a test of endurance more than skill. Anderson finally earned the must-have, go-ahead service break with the help of a point in which the right-hander tumbled to his backside, scrambled back to his feet and hit a shot lefty.
Only one match at the All England Club has been longer: Isner's 2010 first-round victory over Nicolas Mahut, which went more than 11 hours over three days and finished 70-68 in the fifth. That was played over on Court 18, which now bears a plaque commemorating the record-setter.
Anderson, a 32-year-old from South Africa, eliminated eight-time Wimbledon champion Roger Federer in a 13-11 fifth set in the quarterfinals on Wednesday. Between that and the energy-sapper against Isner yesterday, it's hard to imagine how the No. 8 seed Anderson will have much left for Sunday's final, his second at a major.
Anderson was the runner-up to Rafael Nadal at last year's US Open. There could be a rematch now. Anderson's opponent for the title will be Nadal or Novak Djokovic, who did not set foot on Centre Court until just before 8 pm last evening, after waiting around all day. Because it was so late, and with rain forecast, the All England Club shut the retractable roof above the main stadium before the second semifinal.
The expectation was that the first semifinal would be a tight contest filled with tiebreakers and that's precisely what it was. Wimbledon doesn't use tiebreakers in the fifth set for men, or third set for women, so there's nothing to prevent a match from going on and on and on and that's precisely what Isner and Anderson did, often thanks to one ho-hum hold after another. At one point in the fifth set, a spectator shouted, "Come on, guys! We want to see Rafa!"
Could he actually come through? Could this be it? Could we be about to see the sixth and last break? And repeatedly, the answer was, of course, "No," even when Anderson smacked a return winner at Isner's feet to get to break point at 7-all, 30-40. Isner saved that with a 127 mph ace, then added a pair of service winners at 132 mph and 139 mph to hold and yelled, "That's it!"