Davydenko through to Hamburg semis

HAMBURG, Germany, July 24 (UPI) -- Second-seeded Nikolay Davydenko needed three sets Friday to earn a semifinal berth at the Hamburg Open tournament in Germany.

Davydenko battled through a challenge from Victor Hanescu for a 6-3, 4-6, 6-3 win. Hanescu was forced into 12 break-point situations but was able to save nine of them. However, Davydenko only faced one such situation in the first and third sets.

He goes against David Ferrer in Saturday's semifinals. Ferrer advanced on a 6-2, 6-3 win over Simon Greul in just more than an hour. Ferrer didn't face a break point in the match and won 78 percent of the points on serve.

The other semifinal sends 13th-seeded Paul-Henri Mathieu against qualifier Pablo Cuevas. Mathieu was up 3-0 when 10th-seeded Viktor Troicki retired with a foot injury. Cuevas was a 6-2, 6-4 winner Friday over 14th-seeded Nicolas Almagro to become the first qualifier to reach the Hamburg semifinals since 2005.

All of the Hamburg semifinalists are looking for their first ATP titles of the year.