Kiefer Faces Yet Another Russian for ATP Moscow Crown

No. 6 seed Nicolas Kiefer navigated one Russian threat Saturday in the semifinals of the Kremlin Cup in Moscow, defeating qualifier Igor Kunitsyn 6-2, 6-4 -- now one more stands between him and the championship.

"I just want to focus on the final, I played four last year and lost them all," Kiefer said. "I played Andreev before and beat him, but it will be a different story here. He plays at home and I will have no more than two supporters in the crowd."

The German will now take on No. 7 seed Igor Andreev, who survived the all-Russian battle with wildcard Dmitry Tursunov 5-7, 7-5, 6-2.

"Just to be there in the finals it means a lot to me and hopefully I can do well tomorrow," Andreev said. "I played very well on some important points in the second set, then he got a little bit down in the third set. He was winning the match and everything turned around."

Kiefer leads the career head-to-head with Andreev 2-1, with the Russian gunning for his third title of 2005.

The doubles final will feature unseeded defending champs Andreev/Davydenko vs. the Belarus/Russian tandem of Mirnyi/Youzhny.