Czech veteran Radek Stepanek claimed another impressive scalp at Queen’s Club as he followed his shock win over Andy Murray by defeating South Africa’s Kevin Anderson 1-6, 6-3, 6-2 in the quarter-finals on Friday.
Stepanek, ranked 42nd, ended defending champion Murray’s 19-match winning run on grass in the previous round.
And the 35-year-old continued his giant-killing streak by fighting back from a set down to eliminate world No. 18 Anderson to reach the last four at the Wimbledon warm-up for the first time in nine years.
Stepanek was to play Feliciano Lopez yesterday for a place in today’s final after the Spanish 10th seed enjoyed a surprise 6-4, 7-6 (9/7) success against world No. 6 Tomas Berdych.
Stepanek seemed to be suffering a hangover from his stunning victory against Wimbledon champion Murray during a lethargic first set display that saw the big-serving 2.03m Anderson overpower his opponent with ease.
However, Stepanek, supported again by compatriot and Chelsea goalkeeper Petr Cech, wrestled the momentum back to seal his latest impressive win after surviving a 15-ace barrage from the seventh seed.
“It’s great to beat a top guy, but it’s even tougher to back it up with a win again,” said 15th seed Stepanek, who is bidding to win his first singles’ title since 2011 in Washington. “In the first set, Kevin played perfect tennis. For a half hour, I really had no chance. But I once won a match where I faced 78 aces. That was against Ivo Karlovic in the Davis Cup in 2009, so I knew I just had to wait and take my first chance.”
Czech second seed Berdych, a former Wimbledon runner-up, was well below his best against Lopez, the smooth-moving left-hander who had beaten four-time Queen’s champion Lleyton Hewitt in the second round.
Lopez, the world No. 29, broke in the fifth game for a 3-2 lead and easily closed out the set.
The 32-year-old kept the pressure on in the second set and when Berdych double-faulted on match point, Lopez was able to celebrate his 50th win on grass and his first ATP Tour semi-final berth since Gstaad nearly a year ago.
All the upsets at this year’s tournament mean there will be a first-time champion as the four previous winners in the draw — Murray, Hewitt, Sam Querrey and Marin Cilic — were knocked out before the quarter-finals.
Bulgarian fourth seed Grigor Dimitrov did not have to break sweat to reach the semi-finals as his scheduled opponent, Ukrainian eighth seed Alexandr Dolgopolov, was forced to withdraw ahead of their match with a thigh strain.
Dimitrov will face top-seeded Swiss Stan Wawrinka after he defeated Australia’s Marinko Matosevic 7-5, 6-3.
Matosevic, the world No. 60, had earned headlines on and off the court this week after criticising Murray’s decision to hire Frenchwoman Amelie Mauresmo as his coach and then defeating Cilic and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga en route to the last eight.
However, he could not steal the limelight against world No. 3 Wawrinka, who won his maiden Grand Slam in Australia earlier this year and is gradually getting back on track after losing three of his four matches before Queen’s, including a first round exit at the French Open.
Wawrinka’s win is an ominous sign for his remaining rivals as on each occasion he has made the last eight this year he has gone on to take the Chennai, Australian Open and Monte Carlo titles.
GERRY WEBER OPEN
AFP, HALLE WESTFALEN, Germany
Defending champion Roger Federer reached the semi-finals of the Halle grasscourt championships on Friday without appearing on court as quarter-final opponent Lu Yen-hsun of Taiwan withdrew through injury.
Lu, who had self-deprecatingly announced that he faced a mission impossible against the Swiss former world No. 1 when he said: “If I’m 150 percent and he’s 100 percent, I think I’d still lose,” pulled out with a recurrence of a back problem.
Federer, a six-time winner of the tourament, now faces Japan’s world No. 12 Kei Nishikori, who beat American Steve Johnson 6-1, 7-6 (7/4), for a place in the final.
Earlier, Philipp Kohlschreiber fought his way into the semi-finals by edging past fellow-German Dustin Brown 6-4, 5-7, 7-6 (18/16).
Kohlschreiber, who was on the losing end of a five-set marathon against Britain’s Andy Murray at the French Open, prevailed after an epic third set tie-break against world No. 85 Brown.
The defeat was a bitter disappointment for Brown, who had knocked out world No. 1 Rafael Nadal the previous day.
Kohlschreiber, the 2011 champion, now plays 69th-ranked Alejandro Falla for a place in the final after the Colombian overcame another German Peter Gojowczyk 7-6 (7/4), 7-6 (7/2).
Wildcard Gojowczyk also saw his run come to an end in frustrating fashion, having claimed the scalp of third seed Milos Raonic of Canada in the previous round.
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Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
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