Tournament favourite Andy Roddick swept into Wimbledon's fourth round on Friday, brushing aside promising Spaniard Tommy Robredo 7-6, 6-4, 6-4.

He was joined by another big hitter, women's fourth seed Venus Williams, who buried Nadia Petrova 6-1 6-2 in a sublime display.

"Some days everything goes your way," was how the statuesque American explained away the 62-minute rout.

The men's fourth seed, Switzerland's Roger Federer, also earned safe passage. After a mid-match blip he reeled in America's Mardy Fish 6-3, 6-1, 4-6 6-1 with light fading at the All England Club.

Chanda Rubin was caught out in the court one dusk, however, becoming the day's most notable casualty.

The women's seventh seed, who won the Eastbourne warm-up tournament, fell 7-6, 6-3 to Italian Silvia Farina Elia.

Fifth seed Roddick, 20, found the going much smoother against 21-year-old Robredo than his tempestuous second-round clash with Greg Rusedski earlier this week.

Robredo, who made great strides at the French Open earlier this year when he beat top seed Lleyton Hewitt and three-times champion Gustavo Kuerten to reach the quarter-finals, simply failed to match Roddick on Wimbledon's fast lawns.

GRASS ROLL

The American is on a grass roll after winning the prestigious Queen's Club tournament a week before the championships, equalling Rusedski's serving speed record of 149 mph (239.7 kph) during his semi-final victory there over Andre Agassi.

Robredo, whose game was honed on the red clay of his homeland, was unable to cope with the American's big serve and power game, surrendering to a smash that he could only balloon into the net on match point.

"He (Robredo) played a very smart match tactically and my serve bailed me out," said Roddick, who added he was glad to get through in straight sets.

Another young Spanish pretender Rafael Nadal-Parera, who at the age of 17 has surprised Wimbledon with the maturity of his game, also found the fourth round a step too far, succumbing to Thai 12th seed Paradorn Srichaphan 6-4, 6-4, 6-2.

Nadal was the youngest player since 16-year-old Boris Becker in 1984 to reach the third round at Wimbledon and is sure to want to emulate the German who returned the following year to win the title.

Paradorn, who endured two exhausting five-set hauls to reach the third round, can now look forward to long rest before Monday's fourth round where he can expect more fireworks from Roddick.

MAGICAL MYSTERY

Twice former champion Venus can now avenge her fourth-round French Open defeat at the hands of Vera Zvonareva when the pair meet on Monday.

Covering the court with huge yet elegant strides, Venus dominated the third-round match against Petrova, her crisp shots finding corners and lines.

"I just had all the right shots out there ... a really good day," Venus smiled afterwards.

Zvonareva, 18, downed Iroda Tulyaganova 6-3, 7-5 to set up Monday's tie.

With five Russian women still in the draw hopes are high that one of them might repeat Olga Morozova's 1974 final appearance at Wimbledon -- or even grab a first women's grand slam title for the country.

Ai Sugiyama, seeded 13, then ground out a dogged 6-4 6-4 victory over Nathalie Dechy of France, to avenge defeat by the Frenchwoman at Eastbourne.

The 27-year-old Sugiyama, who also reached the fourth round at Wimbledon in 1996, will now play her doubles partner and number two seed Kim Clijsters.

Clijsters, who has dropped only seven games in her journey to the fourth round, was even more brisk than Venus on Friday dismissing American Samantha Reeves 6-1, 6-2 in 50 minutes.

The Wimbledon magical mystery tour of giant-killer Ivo Karlovic came to an end, however, when the Croatian qualifier, who caused a sensation with his dismissal of defending champion Lleyton Hewitt in the first round on Monday, lost 7-6, 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 to Max Mirnyi.

The pair caused some cricked necks on court 13, with Karlovic, the tallest man to compete at the championships, standing 2.083 metres tall and Mirnyi just under two metres.

It was a close run thing with power serves thumping down from either end and the result falling in the Belarussian's favour in the tiebreaks.