Battle of words can't hide Djokovic's superiority

"At the start, I wasn't seeing the ball. I felt everything was a little bit rushed. By the time I got my legs under me, he was on a little bit of a roll."

Before Roddick, the power guy, had his first ace, Djokovic had six aces. In the end, they both had 15. In the end, Djokovic had an apology for his postmatch remarks.

"Look," he said, "I had a very tough day (Wednesday). I was feeling exhausted and empty. I wasn't able to practice. Mentally I had a lot of pressure. Andy made that statement. I don't blame it on him. I reacted on court. It was impulsive.

"I never meant to make excuses in the press. I know what I'm doing is right, to take time out to make my condition better, not to distract my opponent ... I respect everybody's thoughts. Andy was always nice to me when I got on tour. I made a mistake saying (what he did) before 20,000 people. ... I have nothing against the crowd."

Djokovic is quicker than Roddick and hits sharper ground strokes than Roddick. Roddick's hope was to blast away, but Djokovic would return the serves and then get Roddick into a position where he couldn't handle a backhand in the corner or a lob over his head onto the back line. Roddick said he spoke to Djokovic privately after the match, but in public admitted he "should have known better" than to try to be a comedian.

"I felt most people found it funny," Roddick said, "and I tried to build it up. If you look at the transcript, I said I was (No.) 3 and he was (No.) 8. I was trying to build it up as like I'm the favorite.

"I said listen, if you want to do the last 10 days or the last 10 months, he's been the best hard-court player. The only part I don't agree with is, you dish it out, you've got to take it with a smile."

Novak Djokovic didn't, but he did take the quarterfinal match from Andy Roddick, which really is all that matters.