Harrison Joins Nishikori and Ferrer in Acapulco Semis
American qualifier Ryan Harrison continued his stellar run at the Abierto Mexicano Telcel in Acapulco, Mexico on Thursday night, defeating sixth-seeded Ivo Karlovic 4-6, 7-6(0), 7-6(4) to reach the semifinals.
In a match that saw just one break point throughout, Harrison was able to edge the big-serving Croat in tiebreakers in the second and third sets. The 22-year old will take on second-seed and three-time champion David Ferrer.
The Spaniard played the final match of the night and battled with Australian Bernard Tomic. Ferrer was able to break Tomic’s serve three times, including twice in the second set, to edge Tomic 6-4, 3-6, 6-1.
“I feel better. Today I had enough consistency and better pace and I hope to continue like this tomorrow,” said Ferrer. “I’m very happy to be back in the semifinals here. Bernard Tomic is a great player, the best of which there are now of age and has a great future; tomorrow I expect another battle against Harrison.”
The other semifinal in Acapulco will feature top-seeded Kei Nishikori and fourth-seeded Kevin Anderson.
Nishikori hit 23 winners as he rolled past Ukrainian Alexandr Dolgopolov 6-4, 6-4 earlier in the day. The 25-year old from Japan also saved four of five break points.
“It was a really tough match, especially with this win…I’m really happy to win today,” said Nishikori.
He will take on the South African Anderson in the final. Anderson fired 32 winners and came back from a set down to upend Serbia’s Viktor Troicki 3-6, 6-3, 6-3.
“Anderson had been playing really well,” said Nishikori of his semifinal opponent. “I’ll try to play good tennis again; I’ve been playing really well this week. Hopefully I can have another good match tomorrow.”
If Nishikori can knock off Anderson and reach the final, he will move into third in the world rankings. If he can win the title and Nadal fails to win the Buenos Aires title, then Nishikori would jump to number three in the world.
