Montanes tops Davydenko in France

Montanes, seeded sixth, stopped Davydenko 3-6, 7-6 (7-3), 7-6 (7-4). Montanes won just 18 points in the first set Friday and fought off eight of 12 break-point chances for Davydenko.

While the No. 1 seed was eliminated the three other top seeds advanced to Saturday's semifinals, although all needed three sets to do so. Montanes will draw fourth-seeded Ivan Ljubicic while No. 2-seeded Jo-Wilfried Tsonga goes against third-seeded Gael Monfils.

That will be the second consecutive French opponent for Tsonga, who defeated countryman Gilles Simon 6-3, 6-7 (0-7), 6-3 in his quarterfinal match. After getting whitewashed in the second-set tie-breaker, Tsonga fired six aces and won 55 percent of the points in the third set.

Monfils got past fifth-seeded John Isner 3-6, 6-4, 6-4. He nearly matched the hard-serving Isner in aces (12-11) and managed services breaks in the second and third sets in winning.

Ljubicic came from behind in getting past Jarkko Nieminen 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 (8-6). Ljubicic had nine of his 24 aces in the third set and lost only eight points on serve in the set in outlasting Nieminen.

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