Top-seeded Elena Dementieva of Russia rallied to beat Andrea Petkovic of Germany 3-6, 6-4, 6-2 on Friday to reach the semi-finals of the Open GDF Suez.
Flavia Pennetta also advanced with a 6-1, 6-3 win over Tathiana Garbin in an all-Italian quarter-final. She will next face Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic, who cruised past sixth-seeded Shahar Peer of Israel 6-3, 6-0.
Dementieva will meet American teenager Melanie Oudin, who topped Agnes Szavay of Hungary 2-6, 6-4, 6-2.
PHOTO: REUTERS
The unseeded Petkovic broke for a 3-1 lead in the first set and closed it out when Dementieva sent a service return into the net.
“In the first set, I’m putting pressure on her and she wasn’t able to put pressure on me,” Petkovic said. “It was a big surprise.”
Dementieva dropped serve in the opening game of the second set before breaking to level at 2-2. She then slammed a return winner in the 10th game to earn three break points, winning the set on an unforced error from Petkovic.
In the decider, Dementieva jumped out to a 3-1 lead as a tired Petkovic started to make more unforced errors. The Russian won the match when Petkovic sent a forehand into the net.
“She’s a young player with a lot of talent,” Dementieva said of Petkovic. “She had nothing to lose today against me. She was going for her game, for her shots. She put a lot of pressure on me in her service games. Her baseline game is pretty solid. It was a tough win for me.”
“It looks like she has a very powerful game. I was very impressed with her serve today. She was moving well, was very aggressive. For sure, she’s going to improve her ranking position,” the Russian said.
After winning two Fed Cup matches to give the US a 4-1 win over France last week, Oudin has beaten three players ranked higher than her — Sorana Cirstea of Romania, Patty Schnyder of Switzerland and Szavay — for a five-match winning run.
“I guess France seems to like me now,” Oudin said. “I haven’t had very good experiences here in the past, but I think I’m going to be changing my mind after this tournament.”
Szavay wasted seven breakpoint chances, whereas Oudin converted five of seven opportunities.
“I’ve always been a big fighter,” Oudin said. “I just kept fighting and she gave me a couple of free points in the second. And then I started playing a lot better and got more aggressive. That has really helped me win the second and the third.”
“Tennis is such a weird game, it can change like that. My timing was a little off in the first set. It started clicking for me [in the second set]. I just started getting some confidence,” she said.
Meanwhile, Pennetta said after beating Garbin on her fifth match point that it was difficult to be ruthless against her friend.
“It was not easy because we know each other very well,” the second-seeded Pennetta said. “We are friends, we spend time outside the court. But when you go in the court, you just have to concentrate on your game and try to forget there is a friend on the other side.”
In another quarter-final, Safarova won 10 straight games after trailing 3-2 to Peer.
“I was happy with my game today,” said Safarova, the 2007 finalist. “I was serving very well. I was returning her serve pretty well. When I broke her serve, it was a bit easier for me because she started to make more mistakes.”
“I have really good memories from 2007. The crowd was great in supporting me. I was really surprised that they remembered me from three years ago,” she said.
■SAP OPEN
REUTERS, SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA
Andy Roddick out-muscled Tomas Berdych 7-6, 7-6 in a tight contest to earn a place in the final four of the US$530,000 SAP Open on Friday.
The world No. 7, who is chasing a fourth title at the hardcourt tournament, set up a semi-final against compatriot Sam Querrey, who dispatched another American, Michael Russell, 6-4, 6-3 in their quarter-final.
Roddick and the fifth seeded Berdych traded service bombs and big forehands but the Czech missed two key forehands in tiebreakers — one at set point to lose the first 7-5, the second at 5-5 in the second set tiebreaker.
Roddick clinched the latter 7-5 with a 141mph (227kph) service winner to move to within two victories of matching his 2004, 2005 and 2008 triumphs in San Jose.
The two Americans were joined in the semi-finals by Spanish second seed Fernando Verdasco, who punched his way past Lithuanian teenager Ricardas Berankis 6-3, 7-6.
Verdasco is struggling with a sciatic nerve injury but that did not stop him from serving big and unleashing his highly-effective forehand.
The Spaniard overcame the former junior world number one in the tiebreaker 7-5 when he pounded a service winner and then watched the Lithuanian err on a forehand.
Rounding out the last four was Uzbek Denis Istomin, who reached his first ATP Tour semi-final with a 6-1, 1-6, 6-3 upset of German sixth seed Philipp Kohlschreiber.
■ROTTERDAM OPEN
REUTERS, ROTTERDAM
Russian second seed Nikolay Davydenko eased past Juergen Melzer of Austria 6-3, 6-2 to reach the semi-finals of the Rotterdam Open on Friday.
He will take on third seed Robin Soderling for a place in today’s final, after the Swede needed only 49 minutes to wrap up a 6-0, 6-1 win over Julien Benneteau.
Davydenko initially struggled with Melzer’s serve after dropping his own but regained control following a long sixth game to register his third straight sets win in Rotterdam.
“Melzer played some good points in the beginning and I am still struggling with the circumstances on court,” Davydenko told reporters referring to the speed of the surface.
“It might not show from the stands seeing my performance but it is how I feel on court,” he said.
Soderling had a breakout season last year, ending Rafa Nadal’s four-year hold on the French Open but has struggled recently with first round exits in Chennai and the Australian Open.
Top seed Novak Djokovic is already through to the semi-finals after his opponent Florian Mayer withdrew with a hamstring injury.
Djokovic will face the tournament’s 2007 winner Mikhail Youzhny of Russia who overcame Gael Monfils 5-7, 6-2, 6-3 in an entertaining match lasting almost three hours.
Fourth-seeded Frenchman Monfils fought back from 3-0 behind in the first set to take it after playing some spectacular tennis but suffered from inconsistency in the second.
Sixth seed Youzhny recovered from a break down in the final set to beat the world No. 13 before a capacity 9,000 crowd.
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