Top seeded Robin Soderling of Sweden defeated Potito Starace of Italy 6-3, 6-4 to storm into the semifinals of the Swedish Open here Friday. In other quarterfinal, third seeded Tomas Berdych of Czechoslovakia thrashed Blaz Kavcic of Slovakia 6-1, 6-4. Nicolas Almagro of Spain also made it to the last four beating Michael Ryderstedt of Sweden 6-4, 7-6 (7-4), while David Ferrer of Spain advanced beating Andreas Haider-Maurer of Austria 6-1, 6-1. Ferrero in semis Juan Carlos Ferrero beat Marcel Granollers 6-4, 6-3 in an all-Spanish showdown to reach the semifinals of the clay-court Mercedes Cup in Stuttgart Friday. Ferrero will next play Federico del Bonis of Argentina, who advanced to his first career semifinal on the tour by cruising past fellow qualifier Pavol Cervenak of Slovakia 6-1, 6-2. In the late matches Lukasz Kubot of Poland beat Santiago Giraldo of Colombia 7-5, 5-7, 6-3 and Pablo Andujar of Spain beat Cedrik-Marcel Stebe of Germany 6-2, 6-1. Martinez Sanchez thru In Austria, Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez defeated Yvonne Meusburger of Austria 7-6 (5), 4-6, 6-3 Friday to reach her first semifinal of the season at the Gastein Ladies. The 54th-ranked Spaniard rallied from 5-2 down to win the opening set. She converted her second match point after a three-hour rain delay in the final set. Patricia Mayr-Archleitner of Austria routed Bulgarian qualifier Dia Evtimova 6-2, 6-2 to reach her second career semifinal after Bogota, Colombia two years ago. The 109th-ranked Mayr-Archleitner conceded only five points on serve in the opening set and quickly regained control of the match after dropping serve early in the second. The two remaining quarterfinal matches were interrupted by another rain delay and rescheduled for Saturday morning. The eighth-seeded Ksenia Pervak of Russia was leading Spain's Laura Pous-Tio 3-0, and Kateryna Bondarenko of Ukraine was 5-2 ahead against Carla Suarez Navarro of Spain.
