Soderling chases home title

Soderling: Through to semi-finals

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Top seed Robin Soderling advanced in his campaign for a home title victory with a 7-6 (7-4) 6-4 defeat of Guillermo Garcia-Lopez in the Stockholm Open quarter-finals.

The French Open runner-up shook off an early break by his Spanish opponent to triumph in the tenth quarter-final of his breakthrough season.

The world number ten, who was runner-up in the tournament to Argentina's David Nalbandian last year, is battling for one of two remaining places in the eight-man ATP World Finals in London next month. He is ranked a provisional ninth behind Nikolay Davydenko and Fernando Verdasco.

Soderling can gain some ground this week and is next set to face Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus, who earned his place in the semi-finals with a thrashing of fellow former Australian Open finalist Arnaud Clement of France in straight sets 6-4 6-4.

Brazilian Thomas Bellucci served up 18 aces to secure a 7-6 (7-4) 6-3 win over Joachim Johansson in their quarter-final to leave Soderling as the only remaining home hope.

Johansson put up a notable fight, almost matching Bellucci's ace output with 13 of his own.

Breakthrough

Bellucci's previous quarter-final appearance earlier this year carried him on to lift a career breakthrough trophy at Gstaad, and the 21-year-old will contend for a spot in the final against Oliver Rochus after the Belgian defeated Finnish Jarkko Nieminen 6-3 2-6 6-1.

"I stayed concentrated throughout the whole match," said Bellucci, who saved the lone break point he faced while Johansson lost his own serve once.

"I served very well which took pressure off me, so I was very happy with that."

The clash marked Johansson's fourth Stockholm quarter-final defeat, showing the 27-year-old's lack of consistent match play due to years of shoulder injuries.

Johansson's best performance in the competition was in 2006 when he progressed to the semi-finals but lost to Nieminen, who is also currently coming back from injury following surgery on his wrist earlier this year.

The Swede was playing his first quarter-final since January 2007 in Adelaide, where he was defeated by Novak Djokovic.

"He's trying to come back and he's playing very well," said Bellucci of his defeated opponent.

"If he keeps playing like that, I'm sure he'll be back very soon."