Fourth seed Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus, fifth seed Michal Tabara of Czekoslavia, Great Britain's Lee Childs and Philipp Kohlschreiber of Germany sailed into the semi-finals in the USD 25,000 ATP Challenger tennis event at Tumkur, Karnataka, on Friday.
While Marcos carved out a hard-fought 6-3, 5-7, 6-0 win over Stephane Bohli of Switzerland, in a match that stretched to two hours and 12 minutes, Michal overcame a fighting Dieter Kindlmann of Germany 6-7 (7-3), 7-6 (7-5), 6-2 to book berths in the last four stage.
Unseeded Lee Childs, who upset top seed Michal Mertinak in the pre-quarter-finals on Thursday, faced anxious moments in his quarter-final against Francesco of Italy, but managed to beat the Italian 6-7 (7-3), 7-5, 6-4 in three hours and five minutes.
In the other quarter-final, Philipp outclassed Martin Lee of Great Britain 6-0, 7-6 (7-5).
In the doubles, India's Prakash Amritraj and Rik De Voest of South Africa entered the semi-finals, beating the Taipei pair of Ti Chen and Tzuoo Yeu 6-4, 6-3.
The other Indian duo in the fray, Vijay Kannan and Ajay Ramaswamy, also scored an easy victory, beating Marcello (Germany) and Oliver Marach (Austria) 6-2, 6-4 to enter the last four stage.
The Czekoslavia pair of Ota Fukarek and Michal Tabara had already made into the semi-finals.
