Untouchable Federer Into Semifinals at Rotterdam

"He made me work very hard, it was a close match," said Federer, who fought off two break points while serving for the match. "I'm very happy to be through to the semis. It could have been a very different results, it could have gone the three sets."

Three un-seeds joined the Swiss in the semis in Croatians Mario Ancic (d. (3) Henman in two tiebreaks) and Ivan Ljubicic (d. Paradorn Srichaphan, coming from a set down), and Swedish veteran Thomas Johansson (d. Stepanek).

Ljubicic accused The Thai Fighter of breaking into a "victory dance" after earning a break point in the second set of their match, which fired up the Croat.

"I thought that if he could dance, so could I," Ljubicic said. "Let's say I found extra motivation right there. I got some energy, which I used to win the match."

Saturday's semifinals line up as (1) Federer vs. Baby Goran (Ancic won their only meeting at 2002 Wimbledon), and Ljubicic vs. T.Johansson (Croat leads career meetings 3-0).

The doubles semifinals will be (1) Knowles/Nestor vs. (3) Suk/Vizner, and (4) Erlich/Ram vs. (2) Black/Ullyett.