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Soderling scrapes past Youzhny

Soderling edged a close-fought affair with Mikhail Youzhny © Getty Images

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World No. 4 Robin Soderling eventually booked his place in the semi-finals of the World Tennis Tournament in Rotterdam with a hard-fought victory over Mikhail Youzhny.

In a close affair, reigning champion Soderling stunned his Russian opponent to take the first set with a timely break of serve just as proceedings looked to be heading inexorably to a tie-break - a decisive passage of play that gave the Swede an edge he would hold onto throughout the remainder of the game.

Sixth seed Youzhny saved a match point while 6-5 down in the second, as he showed an obvious determination to prolong the contest. That he did, as this time the set did indeed go to a tie-break, but Soderling's greater variety of groundstrokes proved to have the beating of Youzhny's raw determination and emotion, eventually emerging the victor 6-4 7-6(5).

Elsewhere, seventh seed Ivan Ljubicic beat Marco Baghdatis (who disposed of Andy Murray in the previous round) 6-4 6-7(6) 7-6(4) to seal his place in the semi-finals. Ljubicic was made to work far harder than eighth seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, who made his way into the last four with ease after fourth seed Tomas Berdych withdrew due to flu.

Serbia's Viktor Troicki saw off Marin Cilic 7-5 6-3 to round out the day's play, after Jamie Murray joined up with his brother Andy in doubles action to see off third seeds Mahesh Bhupathi and Marcel Granollers 6-3 6-2 in the men's event and book their place in the semi-finals.

Meanwhile at the Brasil Open, top seed Nicolas Almagro and Alexandr Dolgopolov set up a high-profile final in contrasting styles.

Almagro came back to beat Juan Ignacio Chela 1-6 6-2 6-4 while Andy Murray's Australian Open victim knocked out Ricardo Mello 6-2 6-1.

And at the SAP Open, the top two seeds stayed on track in the quarter-finals action. Fernando Verdasco edged out Denis Istomin 6-4 6-4 and Gael Monfils defeated American wildcard Tim Smyczek 6-4 7-6. Lleyton Hewitt went out at the hands of Juan Martin del Potro and Milos Raonic also got through to face Monfils.

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