Fernando Verdasco edges past Julien Benneteau to reach the semis – Suisse Open Gstaad 2011
World number 20, Fernando Verdasco made his way to the round of four after defeating the unseeded Frenchman, Julien Benneteau, in the quarter-finals of Credit Agricole Suisse Open Gstaad on Friday afternoon.
The contest took place on the clay courts the Credit Agricole Arena in Gstaad, Switzerland, with the fourth seeded Spaniard winning the exciting three-setter at 6-4, 5-7, 6-1, to make it into the semi-final draws of the ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) World Tour 250 tournament. Benneteau fought valiantly to stretch the contest to two hours and twelve minutes but had to succumb against the fury of his Spanish opponent in the third set of the game to end his voyage at the Suisse Open.
The unseeded French was led down by his error-ridden game play in the matchup, as he coughed a number of silly mistakes, including nine expensive double faults in contest. Benneteau had a sloppy start in the opening set and dropped his serve in the very first game of the match to trail 0-2. He eliminated the score deficit in the fourth game, when he registered his first serve break of the day to level the scores at 2-2.
Verdasco cashed in another break opportunity in the ninth game to close out the first set at 6-4 to get one up in the contest. The next set went on neck-to-neck without any serve breaks from both men, all the way to reach 6-5, with Benneteau leading. The Frenchman cracked in a vital break point in the 11th game to clinch the second set at 7-5 but his flare was completely blown away by Verdasco in the next set. The belligerent Verdasco fully capitalised upon four double faults of his opponent and nailed three serve breaks to conclude victory at 6-1 in the most assertive manner. A total of 184 points were played in the matchup and Verdasco secured 100 out of them, while Benneteau followed him with 84 to lose the quarter-final matchup.
The last year these two men faced each other in a singles matchup resulted in a straight sets victory for Verdasco, 6-2, 6-1, in the round of 32 at Monte Carlo Masters. The Spaniard’s victory over Benneteau extends his all-time head-to-head lead against him by 3-0 and sends him to the semi-final, where he will take on the top seed fellow compatriot, Nicolas Almagro for a berth in the final of Suisse Open.
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