Defending champion Novak Djokovic emphatically booked his place in a fourth Wimbledon final with a clinical 7-6 (7-2), 6-4, 6-4 defeat of gallant Frenchman Richard Gasquet yesterday. Underdog Gasquet offered fans on a sun-baked Centre Court plenty of "oooh-aahh" moments with his trademark single-handed backhand, but there were not enough to really concern the world No 1. There were a few more unforced errors than normal off the Djokovic racket in a tight first set, but once he cruised through the tiebreak he bolted the door on the 21st seed whose wait for a first grand slam final continues. In the second and third sets a miserly Djokovic made nine unforced errors and his only slight concern was a stiff shoulder that needed visits from the trainer. "It was a good performance, considering the occasion. It's always tough. Richard had a great tournament and deserved to be in the semis," said the eight-time grand slam champion. "The first set could have gone his way, luckily it went to me." The statistics did not give 29-year-old Gasquet's many admirers cause for optimism. The Serb had beaten him 11 times out of 12, lost one of his previous 31 matches against the Frenchman and had not lost to a player ranked as low as Gasquet in a grand slam arena in five years. The first set could have gone his way, luckily it went to me Novak Djokovic Gasquet does possess arguably the most lethal backhand in the game, though, and arrived on court fuelled with the confidence of winning a five-set quarter-final thriller against Stanislas Wawrinka, the man who stunned Djokovic in the French Open final. He used it to great effect early on, too, recovering from dropping his opening service game to break back with a flashing drive, played from shoulder height straight down the line. At 4-4 he fired another beauty that Djokovic barely saw and then had the Serb on the run only to blaze a jump smash wide. Those misses usually prove costly and, although Gasquet played with flair, he disintegrated. "It was 2-2, then it was 7-2 very fast," said Gasquet, who had been looking to become the first Frenchman since Cedric Pioline in 1996 to reach the final. "It wasn't good."
