Nadal survives barrage to advance

TENNIS NEWS:RAFAEL NADAL reached the semi-finals of the Queen's Club ATP tournament for the first time yesterday, absorbing a barrage of lethal serving from giant Croat Ivo Karlovic to post a 6-7 7-6 7-6 victory.

The top seed saw 35 aces fly past his racket but displayed his trademark tenacity and plenty of grasscourt craft to sneak through to face defending champion Andy Roddick.

Roddick was not even required to take to the court after his quarter-final opponent Andy Murray withdrew with a thumb injury sustained the previous day against Ernests Gulbis.

British number one Murray said that his sprained thumb is unlikely to threaten his participation at Wimbledon which starts in 10 days. "It's not terrible, but it's just too sore to try and play a match," said Murray, who missed last year's Wimbledon with a wrist injury, said. "Hopefully in three or four days I'll be able to hit some balls again."

Australian Lleyton Hewitt, who like American Roddick arrived at the west London club looking for a record fifth title, was later brushed aside by Serbia's Novak Djokovic.

Djokovic, the Australian Open champion and semi-final loser to Nadal at Roland Garros last week, produced a clinical display to win 6-2 6-2 and set up a semi-final against either Argentina's David Nalbandian or Frenchman Richard Gasquet. Nadal, who demolished everybody in his path in Paris to win his fourth consecutive French Open title last week without dropping a set, was taken the distance for the second day running after his tussle with Japan's Kei Nishikori on Thursday.

Karlovic, the tallest player on the tour at 6ft 10in, has the most feared serve in tennis and used it to full effect to blunt the Spanish claycourt king's normal pounding baseline game. Nadal only eked out two break points in the whole two hour 24 minute match, both of which he failed to take.

However, his own swinging left-handed delivery was also impressive, if not as spectacular as his opponent's, and Nadal did not once have to face a single break point. "This was a very important win because I beat a specialist on this surface," Nadal, runner-up to Roger Federer at Wimbledon in 2006 and 2007, said. "When I touched the ball, I returned well. Matches like this are decided in two balls. It's very tough mentally."

With serving so dominant on the lush turf the match was always likely to hinge on small details, and so it proved. Karlovic, the oldest player left in the draw at 29, played more tiebreaks than anybody on tour last year and he showed his expertise when he forged a 6-3 lead in the first set shoot-out. Nadal clawed it back to 6-5, but Karlovic boomed another unplayable first serve to take the opener. Nadal got his nose in front in the day's second tiebreak, gaining two set points with a curling forehand winner after a reflex return off the Karlovic serve. He levelled the match when Karlovic sent a forehand long.

Karlovic, who made his name with a first-round defeat of reigning champion Hewitt at Wimbledon in 2003, fended off two break points at 2-2 in the decider but Nadal hung in before pouncing at the death.

Another whipped forehand gave him daylight in the final breaker and he made no mistake at 6-4, wrapping up victory on his first match point.