INQUIRER Sports

PARIS?RAFAEL NADAL SIlenced a partisan crowd by knocking out local favorite and Paris Masters title holder Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, 7-5, 7-5 with an impressive performance on Friday to reach the semifinals.

World No.2 Nadal, who has won the French Open on the other side of town four times but never this event at the Bercy hall, will meet Novak Djokovic for a place in Sunday?s final.

The Serbian world no. 3 earlier ruined Robin Soderling?s hopes of making the World Tour Finals in London by beating the Swede, 6-4, 1-6, 6-3.

Gael Monfils, seeded 15th, later made sure there would be a French presence in the last four by recovering from a set down to oust 12th seed Marin Cilic of Croatia with a 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 win.

The gifted but erratic Monfils worried his fans at first with clumsy errors but then stepped up a gear and thrilled a raucous 14,000 crowd with astonishing winners to set up a semifinal against Radek Stepanek.

Czech Stepanek, the 13th seed, qualified the easy way when US Open champion Juan Martin del Potro, who was hampered by an abdominal strain and was trailing 4-0, retired.

Argentine Del Potro, the world no.5 who had survived seven match points before Chilean Fernando Gonzalez retired in their third-round match late on Thursday, clearly struggled to move around the court before quitting. Reuters