Roger Federer became the first of the leading men's players to book his place in the third round at Wimbledon after racing to a straight sets win over Austrian number one Stefan Koubek.

The Swiss fourth seed won 7-5 6-1 6-1 in just one hour and 16 minutes to set up a tricky clash with on-form American Mardy Fish, a finalist on grass in a warm-up tournament at Nottingham last week.

After a hesitant start which saw him trailing 5-2 in the first set, Federer suddenly appeared to remember where the accelerator was and treated the centre court crowd to the full array of his impressive armoury of shots.

After saving a set point on his own serve at 4-5 in the first, the Swiss star never looked back and even a half-hour rain delay at the start of the third set failed to knock him off his increasingly confident stride.

Two breaks in each of second and third sets put him in control and proceedings were swiftly brought to a halt with an emphatic top-spin volley that spoke volumes about Federer's current state of mind.

He certainly has reason to feel confident. His win at Halle a week before Wimbledon was the first grasscourt title of his career. It also meant he had won on four different surfaces this year -- an achievement no player had managed since Pete Sampras in 1998.

Federer has also demonstrated in the past that, on his day, he is capable of matching the very best at Wimbledon.

Two years ago he played one of the greatest games of his life on centre court to dump Sampras, then at the height of his powers, out of the tournament in the fourth round.

But, as so often in what has been something of a stop-start career, the former world number one in juniors followed up that famous victory by succumbing to Tim Henman in the quarter-finals.

Since then, despite consistently being in the world top 10 and a regular winner of lesser events, he has failed to advance beyond the fourth round at any of the Grand Slam tournaments.

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