Basel: Kei Nishikori ended Juan Martin del Potro’s long winning run at the Swiss Indoors, edging their quarterfinal 7-5, 6-4 here Friday.
Top-seeded Stan Wawrinka’s long underachieving run in Basle continued when the US Open champion lost 6-2, 5-7, 6-1 to 72nd-ranked qualifier Mischa Zverev of Germany. In 13 editions of his home country’s top event, Switzerland’s No. 1 Wawrinka has never reached the final and had not won a match in four straight years.
Nishikori, the World No. 5, is now the highest-ranked player left in a tournament where he lost the final to Roger Federer in 2011. The third-seeded Japanese saved all eight of Del Potro’s break-point chances, and created match point with his seventh ace. Nishikori clinched with an overhead volley winner at the net.
Wawrinka, whose serve was broken in the opening game, seemed to have winning momentum when holding a break point to lead 2-0 in the deciding set. Zverev held serve and, during a run of six straight games to seal victory, provoked Wawrinka to smash his racket to the ground.
Nishikori is seeking his second title of the season and to reach his fifth final. He also won on indoor hard courts at Memphis in February. He plays Gilles Muller of Luxembourg, who earlier outlasted Federico Delbonis of Argentina 6-7 (4), 6-4, 7-6 (3).
Muller clinched the match with five straight points in the third-set tiebreaker soon after Delbonis served for victory at 5-3.
Murray storms into last four
Vienna: Andy Murray cruised past John Isner in straight sets in the Erste Bank Open quarterfinals to keep alive his quest to be the world No 1.
The Scot encountered few difficulties en route to a 6-1, 6-3 success over Isner. Murray now faces defending champion David Ferrer in the final four knowing a tournament victory in Austria, coupled with a success at next week’s Masters event in Paris would see him reach the peak of the rankings for the first time in his career.
The top seed was given an early taste of 6ft 10in Isner’s greatest weapon as he delivered two aces from the first pair of points, though the fact he then had to save two break points suggested Murray would be afforded opportunities.
More break-point chances duly arrived and Murray, using the court’s depth to make Isner stoop to uncomfortable positions, claimed them to race to the first set in 27 minutes. It was sealed by an unforced Isner error, his 20th of the set to Murray’s one. Murray reeled off the first three games of the second set and was eyeing an early finish. Isner finally won a game and pumped up the crowd in relief at doing so and he tested Murray’s own serve by going 0-40 up before the Scot dug deep to stave off the threat.
Ferrer, meanwhile, held off a match point and won the last four games to beat Serbia’s Viktor Troicki 6-3, 3-6, 7-5. Earlier, Tsonga defeated Albert Ramos-Vinolas of Spain 6-2, 7-6 (5) for his third semifinal appearance of the season.
Reuters
