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LONDON: French Open champion Rafael Nadal reached the Queen’s
semifinals for the first time after outlasting Ivo Karlovic in a
grueling three-set clash on Friday.
Nadal, the top seed, who had never gone beyond
the last eight at Queen’s in his two previous visits to the
pre-Wimbledon warm-up tournament, now faces reigning champion Andy
Roddick for a place in the final.
The Spaniard was pushed all the way by the giant
Karlovic before finally winning 6-7 (5-7), 7-6 (7-5), 7-6 (7-4).
Nadal couldn’t break the Croat, a Queen’s
runner-up three years ago, during two hours and 20 minutes of
attritional action, but he managed to win a point on his
opponent’s serve in each of the final two tie-breaks and that was
enough to edge through.
“It is a very important win because I beat a
specialist on this surface, a big server,” Nadal said.
“I didn’t have lot of chances and it was
very tough match, but I was very focused all the time.”
This was grass court tennis of the most brutal
kind and should serve as ideal preparation for Nadal’s bid to
overthrow Roger Federer at Wimbledon.
At 6’10” Karlovic is the tallest
player on the tour and uses his height to devastating effect. He
hammered down over 1,300 aces in 2007 and used his heavy artillery
to keep Nadal on the back foot here.
-- AFP
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