Week 23 Semifinals

While the upsets continue in London, the bleeding seems to have finally ended in Halle, as Federer and Hewitt have moved through to the semifinals with little difficulty. They'll face a pair of Germans for the chance to meet in the final - Petzschner and Becker, who really don't have much realistic expectation of staging an upset, either one. Hewitt and Federer are two of the last three people to win Wimbledon, and it would be perfect to see them facing off in the final of a grass-court warm-up event. I'm sure the organizers would like to see that take place, as well. But there's one more round to go before that happens...

In Queen's, like I said, the upset bug is back. Murray ended up losing to Fish when the match resumed, going down in a third set tiebreak. Fish then came back and beat Michael Llodra later in the day. Very impressive display from the American, who started the year strong but stumbled during the clay season. He'll be glad to be back in a semifinal, and rather than facing Rafael Nadal, he'll get another Spaniard - Feliciano Lopez! F-Lo managed the biggest upset in a week of upsets by beating Nadal, who was on a 24-match win streak and a huge winning streak on grass as well! Big win for Lopez, who has twice been a Wimbledon quarterfinalist. Unlike most Spaniards, I believe that grass is his favorite surface. Not the best way for Nadal to start off his new reign as world number one, but still - very impressive.

The other half of the draw is just about as surprising. Dudi Sela couldn't follow up his win over Andy Roddick and lost to Rainer Schuettler. The veteran German gets American Sam Querry in the semis, as Querrey ousted Xavier Malisse, who toppled Novak Djokovic. Anybody who picked Querrey and Fish into the semifinals here without having Roddick make it that far deserves to win their pool. It seems very likely at this point that we'll have at least one American in the final, and there's not a bad chance of having two.

Put that together with Blake coming back into action next week, and you might even forget how perilously close we are to not having an American in the top ten for the first time in who knows how long. In any case, it's a good weekend of tennis, in Halle and in London.