Tsonga in ruthless form in Stockholm

STOCKHOLM: Top-seededJo-Wilfried Tsonga (pic) defeated Sergiy Stakhovsky 6-3, 6-4 on Friday to earn a place in the Stockholm Open semi-finals against 2009 champion Marcos Baghdatis.

The seventh-ranked Frenchman, playing in the Swedish capital for the first time, put on an impressive display of serve and volley tennis to advance.

The win reinforced his claims to secure a spot at the ATP World Tour Finals.

The Frenchman hunts down the 250 points as a win in this tournament will surely ensure his spot in the season ending tournament.

Leading 5-3 in the second set, Tsonga squandered four match points on Stakhovsky’s serve.

But on his serve, Tsonga finished with a powerful forehand winner on the fifth match point.

Cypriot Baghdatis edged Lithuanian Ricardas Berankis 6-3, 7-6 (74).

The other semi-final match features Spain’s Nicolas Almagro and second-seeded Tomas Berdych of the Czech Republic.

Almagro beat former No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt 6-1, 6-4, while Berdych defeated Russia’s Mikhail Youzhny 6-3, 7-6 (7-2) in the late match.

In a highly entertaining contest filled with baseline rallies, Berdych looked set for a comfortable win when he broke Youzhny early in the second set.

But Youzhny raised his game and immediately broke back, afterwhich the two players held serve until the tie-break. At that point, Berdych moved up a gear, taking a 5-0 lead before sealing his place in Saturday’s semi-finals.

Berdych now has a 6-6 head-tohead in meetings with Youzhny.

The 2012 Stockholm champ will earn US$113,795.