Ljubicic struggles to enter Stockholm semis

Fourth seed Ivan Ljubicic made a great escape from a potential fellow Croatian spoiler, earning a 4-6, 6-2, 6-4 comeback win into the semi-finals of the Stockholm Open on Friday over qualifier Ivan Dodig.


Croatia's Ivan Ljubicic stretches to return against compatriot Ivan Dodig
during their quarter-final of the ATP Stockholm Open tennis tournament
in Stockholm on Friday

The 31-year-old Ljubicic, who lifted the first Masters 1000 title of the season last March at Indian Wells, will play the winner from the Swiss pair of World No 2 Roger Federer and fifth seed Stanislas Wawrinka.
Federer, who played his 900th career match on Thursday as he beat Taylor Dent at the Kungligahallen, is looking for another season of 50 wins. He can achieve that by defeating his good friend and Olympic gold medal doubles partner Wawrinka.

Flying Finn Jarkko Nieminen continued to storm through a career comeback, winning his 11th match since the US Open.The resurgent No 45 thrashed James Blake 6-0, 6-2 in 49 minutes to hand the two-time Stockholm champion only his second defeat at the tournament against 15 victories.

Blake went into the contest leading Nieminen 6-0, with five of their contests going to three sets.
Ljubicic needed a set to find his game against Dodig, the No 132 who began his week by beating eighth seed Tommy Robredo and was competing in his second career ATP quarter-final.

The veteran who trained with Federer this week in front of a standing-room only crowd of 5,000 at the venerable royal tennis hall, recovered against Dodig after losing the first set in 55 minutes. He took the second on a double break and went up an early break in the final set to finally post his 23 win of the season against 16 losses.

"I had chances in the first set which I didn't manage to take," said the winner. "But I know Ivan's game well, and there is nothing I can do on court that he had not already seen. I'm happy to be in the semis."u00a0