TENNIS WORLD

Top seed and '06 Indy champion James Blake needed only 45 minutes to reach the semifinals at the Indianapolis Tennis Championships presented by Lilly as he cruised past Chinese Taipei's Yen-Hsun Lu 6-2, 6-0 on Friday night.
It is the first time since the tournament moved to hard courts in 1988 that the top four seeds have reached the semifinals.
Blake converted five of eight break points and never faced a break point on his serve. Blake won all 20 first serve points and lost only seven second serve points in seven service games.
He will face No. 3 seed and defending champion Dmitry Tursunov in the semifinals. Tursunov came back to defeat Chilean Paul Capdeville 3-6, 6-3, 6-1 in the last match of the day. Tursunov advanced to his first ATP semifinal since January when he captured the title in Sydney.
After losing his serve twice in the opening set, Tursunov broke Capdeville twice in each of the last two sets. He broke for the first time for a 4-3 lead in the second set and added another break in the ninth game. The Russian raced out to a 5-0 lead in the decisive set with breaks in the second and fourth games.
Although Tursunov fired 12 aces, he double-faulted nine times and compiled only a 42 percent first serve mark. Tursunov converted all four break opportunities while Capdeville was two of three on break point chances.
In the day session, No. 2 seed Gilles Simon advanced to his first career ATP semifinal on American soil as he ousted No. 5 Tommy Haas 4-6, 6-4, 6-2.
The 25-year-old Frenchman rallied from a set and 1-3 deficit to beat Haas for the first time in three meetings. Simon, who is making his Indianapolis debut this week, entered a career-high No. 25 in the South African Airways ATP Rankings.
Simon dropped his serve in the 10th game of the opening set and was broken in the fourth game of the second set before coming back. He broke Haas for the first time in the fifth game and then broke the German again in the ninth game. He served it out to level the match at one set each.
In the third set, he broke Haas in the opening game and added another break in the seventh game to secure the victory.
Simon converted four of 12 break points while losing his serve twice in the two hour and two minute match. Simon, who captured his third career ATP title in Casablanca in May (d. Benneteau) and reached the semifinals in Rotterdam (l. to Soderling) in February, will next take on No. 4 seed Sam Querrey (pictured) for the first time. The last Frenchman to reach the Indy final was Olivier Delaitre in 1994 (l. to W. Ferreira).
Querrey fired 17 aces and reached the semifinals in Indianapolis for the second straight year with a 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 win over Bobby Reynolds.
The 20-year-old California native was down a break (1-2) in the third set before breaking back in the next game. Querrey broke Reynolds in the eighth game and then served out the match.
Querrey improved to 22-15 on the season by advancing to his third ATP semifinal (or better). He captured his first ATP title in Las Vegas in March and was a semifinalist in Delray Beach in February.
Querrey converted four of six break points while saving three of five on his serve in the one hour and 16 minute match.
"I stuck with it and fought hard and he eventually made a few errors in the third," said Querrey, who is 2-0 lifetime against Reynolds. "I thought I picked up my game a little bit and served better."