TENNIS in DEPTH.

Australian tennis ace Lleyton Hewitt has welcomed the birth of his third child, a yet-to-be named baby girl, saying he is “elated” at the addition to his family. Hewitt said his actress wife Bec gave birth on Tuesday, in a posting on his official website, delivering a sister to Mia, 4, and one-year-old Cruz.

“Bec, Mia, Cruz and I welcomed a beautiful baby girl into our family last Tuesday,” Hewitt wrote late Saturday on his site. “Mum and baby are great! Dad, big sister and brother elated.” Hewitt said the baby’s name would be announced later in the week.

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Lleyton Hewitt crashed out of the US Open on the opening day as he suffered a five-set defeat against France’s Paul-Henri Mathieu.

The Australian 32nd seed, who had never previously lost in the first round at Flushing Meadows, battled bravely as he fought back from two sets down to level the match but his opponent eventually prevailed 6-3 6-4 5-7 4-6 6-1. 

Afterwards Hewitt, the 2001 winner, dismissed talk of retirement and insists he can still compete at the highest level.

The 29-year-old said: “I still believe I can improve as a player.

“When I play my best tennis, like in Halle (in June, when he beat Federer to win the title), I still feel like I can match it with anyone.”

Fernando Gonzalez has admitted fears over his long-term future in the game after injury forced him out in the first round of the US Open.

The 30-year-old Chilean, playing only his second match since the French Open, retired when 7-6 1-6 0-1 down against Croatian qualifier Ivan Dodig.

The persistent knee injury that has been troubling for the past few months was once again the nemesis of Gonzalez who acknowledged afterwards that he was concerned for his career.

“I’m worried and I’ll have to see what will happen,” he declared.

“I’m not thinking about retirement quite yet but I’ve had a really bad six months and, if this was to go on for longer, maybe two years, then I would have to see.”

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Andy Roddick had to dig deep in a tough encounter with Rajeev Ram before booking his place in the quarter-finals of the Atlanta Tennis Championships.

The world number nine, back in action for the first time since Wimbledon, became the fifth American to reach the last eight of the hardcourt tournament by posting 6-1 6-7 (1/7) 6-3 triumph.

Roddick joins John Isner, Mardy Fish, Taylor Dent and Michael Russell as the US contingent in the next round.

Next up for the 2003 US Open champion is a meeting with seventh seed Xavier Malisse, who advanced with a 6-3 6-3 win over Ukraine’s Illya Marchenko.

Roddick defeated Malisse in the Atlanta final in 2001, the last time the ATP Tour visited the city prior to this year, and enjoys an 8-0 career record against the Belgian.

Donald Young failed to make it six Americans in the last eight as he went down to a 7-5 6-3 defeat at the hands of South African Kevin Anderson, while third seed Lleyton Hewitt was a surprise casualty as he lost 6-4 6-2 to Slovakia’s Lukas Lacko.

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Former champion Lleyton Hewitt eased to a straight-sets victory over fellow seed Gael Monfils at Wimbledon to set up an intriguing fourth-round contest against Novak Djokovic.

Hewitt, who has undergone two hip operations in the past two years, moved around Centre Court well during his 6-3 7-6 (11/9) 6-4 triumph.

The 23-year-old Frenchman offered little resistance to the 2002 winner’s serve until the third set and spurned the chance to put Hewitt under pressure when he wasted three set-points during the tie-break.

Novak Djokovic thrashed Spain’s Albert Montanes 6-1 6-4 6-4 to march into the fourth round of Wimbledon.

The Serbian third seed was taken to five sets by Olivier Rochus in his opening match at the All England Club but has failed to drop a set since.

Montanes, the world number 31, rarely troubled the hugely impressive Djokovic throughout a one-sided match that took one hour and 41 minutes to settle.

Djokovic’s serve – he fired 11 aces – did most of the damage with Montanes failing to secure a single break point as he sought to secure his first appearance in the fourth round of a Grand Slam.

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Roger Federer suffered a rare defeat on grass as he was beaten 3-6 7-6 (7-4) 6-4 by Lleyton Hewitt in the final of the Gerry Weber Open in Halle.

Before Sunday, Federer had been defeated on grass just once since 2003, that coming in the remarkable 2008 Wimbledon final against Rafael Nadal.

At Halle, Federer had won 29 straight matches as he secured five straight titles in Germany from 2004 to 2008.

The six-times Wimbledon champion had not lost a match there since 2002.

Hewitt, a Wimbledon winner in 2002, ended the two hour 20 minute contest with a shot which hit the tape and dropped dead on Federer’s side.

The victory for the Australian, at 29 a year older than Federer, ended a run of 15 defeats to the Swiss superstar.

After cruising through the previous four rounds without dropping a single set, Federer – who did not compete at Halle in 2009 – certainly met his match in an eye-catching battle between two former world number ones.

The Swiss started strongly and earned two breaks on Hewitt’s first service game and appeared set to make light work of his sixth Halle final, taking the first set 6-3.

But Hewitt broke early in the second set, confirming he was willing to make a fight of it.

Federer broke back immediately and the game followed serve. Hewitt won the tie-break, converting his fourth set point to level the match and becoming the first player to take a set off Federer in Halle since 2006.

The final set belonged to the Australian, who broke again in Federer’s first service game and never looked back.

“It’s fantastic,” said Hewitt who will surely move on to Wimbledon, which starts on 21 June, with renewed confidence.

“Roger is a hell of an opponent and everybody knows how good he is on grass. His record speaks for itself and I just got lucky.”

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Lleyton Hewitt will try to find a way to prevent Roger Federer from winning a sixth Halle title after they both claimed semi-final wins at the Gerry Weber Open on Saturday.

Australia’s Hewitt defeated Benjamin Becker of Germany 6-7 (4/7) 7-6 (7/3) 6-2 to seal his place in the final and watched on as Federer, who has won on all his appearances in Halle since 2003, triumphed in the day’s second last-four contest.

Roger Federer, the world number two for the first time since June 29, 2009, beat Germany’s Philipp Petzschner 7-6 (7/3) 6-4 in one hour and 31 minutes for his 29th straight win at the grass-court tournament in northern Germany.

Federer has won the event in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2008. He did not play in 2007 or 2009.

It was the first meeting between the two and Federer suffered a surprise as he conceded two breaks in the opening set. However, he fought back and prevailed in the tie-break.

Federer secured the only break in the second set and served out the match to end Petzschner’s resistance.

Federer, the reigning Wimbledon champion, will meet now meet Hewitt, the most successful active grass-court player, having won 97 and lost 23 matches.

The pair have met on 24 previous occasions, with the Swiss winning the last 15 meetings.

Federer leads the duel 17-7, including 3-1 on grass.

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Roger Federer must be relaxing in his hotel suite tonight in Germany with a contented smile on his face after learning that all his potential rivals for the 2010 Wimbledon title have fallen by the wayside on the grass courts at Queeens.

If his role as the favourite to win yet another Wimbledon title was ever in doubt, then those doubts must have been erased today.

Roger Federer stayed on course to win a sixth Halle title after a straight-sets win over Germany’s Philipp Kohlschreiber in the quarter-finals of the Gerry Weber Open.

The world number two and reigning Wimbledon champion set up victory by going on a five-game winning streak from 5-5 in the opening set, and eventually prevailed 7-5 6-3.

Federer has gone 28 matches undefeated at the grass-court tournament in northern Germany, winning the event in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2008. He did not play in 2007 or 2009.

The Swiss recognised the mid-match surge had been all important against Kohlschreiber, the man he beat in the 2008 final.

“Ten strong minutes led to today’s success,” Federer said on gerryweber-open.com.

“It was a bit of a bumpy start, but then I found my rhythm.”

Federer will take on another home hope, Philipp Petzschner, in the semi-finals.

Petzschner defeated Slovakia’s Lukas Lacko 6-4 6-3, and Federer said: “That is not going to be easy. Philipp has played really well here and I have watched him, but we have not played each other yet.”

The other last-four clash will also feature a German, with Benjamin Becker taking on Australian Lleyton Hewitt.

Hewitt reached his first semi-final of the season thanks to a 7-6 (7/0) 6-1 victory over Andreas Beck.

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Lleyton Hewitt, the 12th seed, was sent crashing out as the Australian lost 7-6 (7/3) 6-4 to world number 59 Eduardo Schwank.

Fourth seed Fernando Gonzalez made a shock second-round exit at the Barcelona Open after losing to unheralded Spaniard Albert Ramos-Vinolas.

The world 166 had claimed his first ATP Tour win when he beat Michael Russell in the first round, but usurped that with a dramatic 6-4 6-7 (8/10) 6-3 success against Gonzalez.

Third seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga enjoyed an easy afternoon on his Barcelona debut, beating Jan Hajek 6-3 6-2.

Tsonga, who turned 25 last Saturday, will next meet Spanish 15th seed Nicolas Almagro who he beat in the second round at Monte Carlo last week.

“Almagro is a great player and it will be difficult to get a win against him,” the Frenchman said.

“I beat him last week, but I was playing at home. This time it is him who is at home, and he’s going to get a lot of support, so I’m going to have to play a very solid match.”

Fifth seed Fernando Verdasco swept past another Frenchman, Richard Gasquet, 7-5 6-3 while former world number one Juan Carlos Ferrero improved his impressive clay-court record this year after Sergiy Stakhovsky retired from their match when trailing 6-3 4-2.

Ferrero, the 2001 champion, now has an 18-2 win-loss record on clay this season, which includes title victories at Costa do Sauipe and Buenos Aires.

Other seeds to progress where David Ferrer (eight), Jurgen Melzer (11), Thomasz Bellucci (13) and Feliciano Lopez (16).

Spanish duo Ferrer and Lopez were straight-sets winners against wildcard Marcel Granollers and Denis Istomin respectively.

Melzer struggled to end the run of Barcelona-born Oscar Hernandez, who fired 11 aces, 6-7 (4/7) 7-5 7-5 while Bellucci also took three sets to beat Victor Hanescu 6-2 1-6 7-5.

Elsewhere, Italian qualifier Simone Bolelli beat wildcard Alberto Martin and Guillermo Garcia-Lopez saw off lucky loser Teimuraz Gabashvili.

Ernests Gulbis and Thiemo de Bakker were straight-sets winners against Jeremy Chardy and Daniel Gimeno-Traver respectively.

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