Andy Murray Into the Cauldron of Wimbledon Semi-final

Andy Murray left the evening TV schedules in peace and was gentle with the country's nerves as he sauntered into his first Wimbledon semi-final shortly before 5pm with a straight sets victory over Juan Carlos Ferrero. Anxiety will return in floods when Britain's No 1 confronts the big-serving Andy Roddick as the 73-year search for the new Fred Perry shifts from hope to expectation.

Tim Henman reached this Friday threshold four times in a grass-court career that would have made Sisyphus wince. But sentimental optimism is not the prevailing mood around Murray's quest. To become the country's first male Wimbledon singles winner since Hitler reoccupied the Rhineland, he will need to defeat the world's sixth best player in Roddick, and then probably the five time champion, Roger Federer, in Sunday's final.

The sporadic brilliance of Murray's play against Ferrero confirmed the deep authenticity of his push to cut British tennis down from its wheel of fire.

The underdog years have passed. Bookies will favour Murray to rescue the British sporting public from their annual Friday blues. He has beaten Federer in their last four meetings and is the world's No 3 ranked player. He has all the skills to negate Roddick's booming serve. Into the cauldron he now goes to find out whether he has the big-stage mental fortitude to support his athletic gifts.

From the air-conned floodlit dome of his tense fourth round win over Stanislas Wawrinka, which ended at 10.38 on Monday night, serve and volley returned to its sunlit heartland, with an open air, mid-afternoon duel under a blazing sky. No need for a canopy and no sign of melodrama. Murray's mastery of Ferrero in a match that was over in 1hr 41m was a useful corrective to the exhaustion of his victory over Wawrinka.

Now 22, Murray was 15 and on a flight to a junior tournament when Henman lost the last of his four Wimbledon semi-finals, in 2002. The pretender returns to action tomorrow not as the frail emissary of the shires but as a lone hunter who exhibits no urge to be the darling of the middle-classes.

Which is just as well, on Wimbledon's central stage, because the arena was at least a third-empty when he came on to play at 3.15pm.

This is the one sure echo of the Henman years. After lunch, Centre Court is often under-subscribed. "I wouldn't recommend anyone sitting in the heat for five hours in a row, so it didn't bother me," Murray said, charitably. But the poor turnout strengthened the case of those who predict a new Wimbledon of 8pm starts on a Centre Court lit up like a mini-Wembley and filmed from the night sky by a Goodyear blimp.

Murray is playing well enough to lay Perry's ghost to rest before domed grass-court tennis becomes a prime-time norm, though the forecast is for heavy showers both on Friday and for Sunday's final. So Britain's first win since 1936 could yet come in an arena that will feel like a large Kew Garden greenhouse. Murray now has valuable experience of the extra humidity, altered acoustics and slower ball velocity that playing under a closed roof adds to the mix.

Federer, who will play Tommy Haas, an 80-1 shot before the championships started, in Friday's other semi-final, is attempting to become the first to win a 15th Grand Slam title after equalling Sampras' record of 14, at this year's French Open. So Murray is not the only one on a mission.

A sure sign of his progress is that celebrities are in a race to buddy-up to him. Sean Connery calls regularly and today he received a handwritten note from Sir Cliff Richard, whose unofficial job as crowd entertainer/tormentor in rain breaks went with the roof. "I don't have any of his records, but my mum does," said the note's recipient.

Murray, a laconic soul, conceals his lack of interest in celeb-endorsements behind his shrugs and his monotone. The ballyhoo leaves him cold. "You don't take anything that's being said about you," he said. "You know, I don't read it because 90% of the stuff's gonna be pretty much untrue anyway."

He is no poet, but today his racket spoke beautifully.