seeded Caroline Wozniacki reached the final of the Pan Pacific Open against former champion Elena Dementieva when she survived a late comeback to beat Victoria Azarenka 6-2, 6-7 (3), 6-4 Friday. Dementieva, who won here in 2006, beat French Open champ Francesca Schiavone 6-4, 7-5 in the other semifinal. Wozniacki could overtake Serena Williams as No. 1 in the world rankings if she lifts the trophy Saturday and reaches the quarterfinals or better in Beijing next week. Wozniacki raced to a 5-0 lead in the third set before the eighth-seeded Azarenka closed the gap to 5-4. The Dane held serve and won when Azarenka returned long. “At 5-love I felt really good, I thought the match was mine,” Wozniacki said. “Then Victoria started playing well and all of a sudden the score is 5-4 and I knew I had to close it out with my serve. “The third set was really tough. It was like a new match, a new game.” Both players struggled on serve. Azarenka conceded 12 double faults, including one that allowed Wozniacki to level the second set 6-6. The Belarusian won the tiebreaker to send the match into a third set. “I may have come back from 5-1 or 5-2 before, but never 5-love,” Azarenka said. “I lost my concentration but it's hard to keep your concentration for that long.” Nadal eases into semis In Bangkok, world No. 1 Rafa Nadal advanced to the semifinals of the Thailand Open with a 6-2, 6-3 win over Kazakhstan's Mikhail Kukushkin Friday. The Spaniard, who won his ninth Grand Slam at last month's US Open, overpowered the 22-year-old with a polished all-round performance. Nadal broke the 83-ranked Kazakh at 3-2 in the first set and and won six straight games before Kukushkin answered back. Nadal served well throughout the second set and kept his opponent on the back foot with some punishing forehand drives. “It was a much better performance than yesterday and I felt really happy. My serve-kick worked really well,” Nadal told reporters. Referring to his US Open triumph, Nadal said he still had more room for improvement and admitted it would be difficult to keep his No. 1 ranking for a long time. Unseeded Jarkko Nieminen and Benjamin Becker booked places in the semifinals after impressive runs in a tournament decimated by early exits of its top-ranked players. Finland's Nieminen beat third-seeded Austrian Juergen Melzer 6-3, 7-6 to set up a semifinal with Becker, the 2007 finalist, who outplayed fellow German Daniel Brands 6-4, 6-2. Nieminen, the world number 60, put his form down to a recent change in coach and improvements to a game he said had stagnated. Nadal will next face after Guillermo Garcia-Lopez of Spain beat Ernests Gulbis of Latvia 7-6(4), 4-6, 6-3. Those who made early exits include second-seeded Fernando Verdasco, former US Open champion Juan Martin del Potro and Serbian Viktor Troicki. Soderling, Berdych ousted Top-seeded Robin Soderling of Sweden was eliminated in the Malaysian Open quarterfinals Friday, losing 6-3, 6-2 to Andrey Golubev of Kazakhstan's in just 71 minutes. Golubev broke the hard-serving Soderling four times while saving all four break points he faced. The fifth-ranked Swede struggled with his consistency, mixing five aces with six double faults. Golubev will next face David Ferrer of Spain, who outlasted third-seeded Thomas Berdych of the Czech Republic 4-6, 7-5, 6-4. Fourth-seeded Mikahil Youzhny of Russia also rallied from a set down to beat No. 6 Marco Baghdatis of Cyprus 6-7 (5), 7-5, 6-1. He will play fellow Russian Igor Andreev, who defeated Canada's Milos Raonic 6-1, 3-6, 6
