Ferrer fires into Barcelona final

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FE Team | Published: April 24, 2011 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

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BARCELONA, Spain, April 23 (AFP): David Ferrer reached his second straight clay final Saturday as the fourth seed set up half of another potential all-Spanish final at the Barcelona Open with a 6-3, 6-4 defeat of Nicolas Almagro. The winner, beaten last weekend in the Monte Carlo final by Rafael Nadal, is likely to find himself in a repeat of that contest if top seed Nadal gets past Croatian outsider Ivan Dodig in the day's second semi-final. Ferrer reached his home title shot in just over 90 minutes, earning victory on his third match point. Almagro, who will find himself in the ATP Top 10 for the first time in his career on Monday, salvaged a pair of Ferrer match-winners in the penultimate game and saved a third one a game later. Ferrer, a dogged retriever, has now beaten Almagro in all seven of their meetings. He won despite five aces from his opponent and forced Almagro to save nine of a dozen break points. The win was in contrast to their last meeting, with Ferrer only winning that one two months ago after two hours, 42 minutes in Acapulco. Nadal, Ferrer and Almagro are the top three-ranked Spaniards, with a local into the final for a 15th consecutive year at the Real Club de Tenis. Nadal has won five of the last six editions but did not play in 2010 due to a knee injury. Ferrer was playing a Barcelona semi for the fifth year in a row but has never nosed to victory after losing 2008 and 2009 finals to Nadal. Ferrer has now won 18 of his last 22 matches at the event.