Tomas Berdych backed up his marathon fourth-round win over Roger Federer with a grueling three-set victory over Fernando Verdasco Thursday to reach the Sony Ericsson Open semi-finals for the second time in three years.Two weeks ago in Indian Wells Berdych clipped Verdasco 6-0, 6-3 but today was a much different story. Berdych needed to win a second-set tie-break just to stay alive and ultimately needed 2 hrs., 51 mins. to edge the Spaniard 4-6, 7-6(5), 6-4 in a bruising encounter.
On Saturday the Czech will play Robin Soderling, who defeated Mikhail Youzhny 6-1, 6-4 in the other quarter-final on Thursday. This is Berdych's second semi-final of 2010, having reached the last four in Brisbane in the first week of the season.
“It was a great match, definitely," said Berdych, who saved seven of nine break points - just as Verdasco did - and who won just one more point than his opponent. "The beginning for me was a little bit slow, because I was still feeling a little bit tired after the long, long match against Roger, finishing that late in the night."
Thursday, 1 April 2010
Singles - Quarter-finals
[5] R Soderling (SWE) d [13] M Youzhny (RUS) 61 64
[16] T Berdych (CZE) d [10] F Verdasco (ESP) 46 76(5) 64
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