Andy Roddick was satisfied with his improved form heading into the rest of the indoor season after exiting in the Shanghai Masters quarter-finals.
Roddick did not arrive in Shanghai in the best of moods after losing in the first round of the China Open and then subsequently walking out of a press conference when a journalist questioned him over possible retirement plans.
However the American picked up his game to see off seventh seed Nicolas Almagro before losing a tight last eight clash with David Ferrer 6-7(5), 6-2, 7-6(2).
"I wasn't too pleased with my effort last week. You know, here I thought I played okay for the first two days of the tournament, probably a little bit better yesterday and today. You know, a lot of the points I was losing today, you know, even if I made an unforced error, it was six, seven, eight, ten balls in. He forced me to do that. Hit a couple great passing shots in the breaker. That was all there was," Roddick said afterwards.
"He was missing a little bit in the first. I thought second and third sets he played at an extremely high level and served pretty well. You know, you normally don't count on him making a lot of first serves, hitting aces. I felt like today he did that and got himself out of trouble a couple of times. When he's doing that, he's definitely tough to beat."
Roddick now heads to Europe where he will finish the season with ATP Basel and the Paris Masters.
