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Wawrinka, Djokovic benefit from retirements

  • Story Highlights
  • Andy Roddick quits in the semifinal of the Rome Masters with an arm injury
  • Stanislas Wawrinka reaches his first Masters final, leading 3-0
  • Roddick is unable to serve after suffering the injury
  • Radek Stepanek quits in the other semi against Novak Djokovic at 0-6 0-1
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ROME, Italy -- Stanislas Wawrinka reached the final of the Rome Masters on Saturday when sixth seed Andy Roddick retired after losing the first three games of their semifinal.

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Roddick has treatment on court before deciding that he cannot continue the semifinal.

The other semi also ended prematurely when Radek Stepanek retired after losing the first seven games of his match with third seed Novak Djokovic.

American Roddick appeared to injure the shoulder on his serving arm early on and could not serve.

He called for the trainer but after an injury time-out he played only one point of his next service game before quitting.

Wawrinka thus reached his first ever Masters Series final, a day after reaching a semifinal at this level for the first time.

It continues a notable run here where he had already put out 16th seed Andy Murray and eighth seed James Blake in previous rounds.

After facing a battle to hold his opening service game, he broke Roddick in the second game and then held serve comfortably in the third.

Roddick pulled up sharply on one point early in the third game and then seemed to be restricted in his movement, making no effort to reach the Swiss's shots throughout the rest of the game.

Following just one attempt to serve in the fourth game, he called a halt and went to the net to explain to his opponent that he could not serve.

If the crowd were hoping for a more riveting contest when Djokovic tackled Stepanek, who pulled off a fine upset victory over Roger Federer on Friday, they were to be sorely disappointed.

Stepanek put up barely any resistence in the first set, seemingly struggling physically.

He received lengthy treatment at the end of the first set but quit after one more game.

It was the second successive easy ride for Djokovic after Spaniard Nicolas Almagro pulled out of their quarterfinal at the same point, after one game of the second set.

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