Fish blocking Murray's path

Mardy Fish hopes to net his biggest prize by capturing the scalp of tournament favourite Andy Murray.

American Fish, the tournament's number eight seed, faces the Briton on the centre court later buoyed by praise from Murray ahead of their encounter.

Fish despatched Feliciano Lopez 6-1 6-4 and although Murray made light work of beating Guillermo Garcia-Lopez 6-4 6-4 in his third round clash, the Scot acknowledged that he will have to step up a level against Fish.

"Fish is a very good grass court player," said Murray. "I will have to raise my level to beat him.

"I have played him a few times and we get on well. Like I say, he's a very good grass court player.

"He has a big serve and likes to come to the net. He likes short points, so, you know, I'll have to pass and return well."

Andy Roddick, bidding to be the first player to win the tournament five times, managed to eclipse another four-time champion, Lleyton Hewitt, 7-6 (7-2) 7-6 (7-4) to reach the quarter-finals.

Their game was initially held up on centre court because of a security scare. A bomb threat had been discovered pinned to a wall just before the game was set to start - however, following a thorough search nothing was found and the game got under way.

The two former world number ones have dominated the AEGON Championships in recent years, sharing eight titles between them since the turn of the century.

But Roddick, the tournament's number two seed, proved too powerful for Hewitt in their 11th meeting.

The American now faces Ivo Karlovic, the tournament's number nine seed, in today's quarter-final.

Defeated Hewitt did not believe the delayed start had any bearing on the eventual outcome of the game.

"We weren't told anything," said Hewitt. "They just said that we had to wait, there was something going on. There obviously was a bit of a commotion out on the court. We weren't 100% what was going on.

"We're professional enough now and experienced enough to go out there as soon as we had to.

"Not many guys are going to beat him on this surface. There are only a handful of guys who have the opportunity probably if he's serving that well."

Winner Roddick is already focusing on his forthcoming battle with the Croatian.

Roddick said: "Against Ivo there's so much that's out of your control. "A guy serves huge from 6ft 10in, a lot of times - you're going to be walking side-by-side spectating.

"I think you've just got to focus on holding your own serve, and I've done that against him in the past.

"The only thing you can do is put yourself in a position to succeed, and it's a matter of if you get a shot or not."