Open in Hamburg – All Spanish Semi Finals

Written by: Global Chick on 23rd July 2011

Open in Hamburg - All Spanish Semi Finals

Fernando Verdasco of Spain in action during the ATP match against Juergen Melzer of Austria at Rothenbaum in Hamburg, Germany, 22 July 2011. EPA/ANGELIKA WARMUTH |

It will be an all-Spanish semi-final at the bet-at-home Open German Tennis Championships 2011. The number three seed Nicolas Almagro won in two tie-break sets against local favourite Florian Mayer 7-6 (5) 7-6 (3).

If Almagro wins his next match he will be in his fifth ATP Tour final of the season. The Spaniard won the Movistar Open in Chile, The Copa Claro in Argentina and the Open de Nice Côte d’Azur. He was also the runner up at the Acapulco tournament where he lost to David Ferrer in the final.

Almgro’s semi-final opponent is Fernando Verdasco who took out Austrian Jurgen Melzer in three sets 6-3 2-6 6-4. The match lasted just over two hours. Verdasco has dropped to No. 22 on the ATP Tour ranking. The former World No. 7 is hoping to reach his third final of the season by beating fellow Spaniard Nicolas Almagro. Verdasco finished runner up in both San Jose and Estoril Open. Verdasco has won three out of the four times the pair has played.

In the top half of the draw the fourth seeded Mikhail Youzhny had to work hard to over come Croatia’s Marin Cilic. The No. 12 seed Cilic had two match points in the third set tie-break. Youzhny came out on top this tim winning 4-6 6-3 7-6 (6).

“It was a very tough and a long match. At match point I was more luck in the tie-break wit the net ball. Today, I was lucky,” Youzhny said.

The Russian has got a good winning record of 7-1 against his next opponent Frenchman Gilles Simon. Simon, the fifth seed took out his fellow French buddy Gael Monfils in three sets in the quarter-finals.

Simon said, “Tomorrow’s match is going to be hard. I have defeated him only once and I have lost seven times.”

In the bet-at-home Open doubles competition one team is through to the final. Frantisek Cermak and Filip Polasek the number four seeds beat Sergiy Stakhovsky and Radek Stepanek 7-5 6-3.

Cermak and Polasek will play the winner of Oliver Marach and Alexander Peya and Andreas Beck and Christopher Kas in the final on Sunday.