TENNIS ROUNDUP : Wilander’s Slide Ends on Clay at Pinehurst

Vince Spadea’s game suddenly collapsed and Mats Wilander advanced to his first tournament semifinal in four years Friday with a 2-6, 6-4, 6-1 victory in the U.S. Tennis Assn. Clay Court Classic in Pinehurst, N.C.

Once the No. 1 player in the world, Wilander was last in a semifinal at Itaparica, Brazil, in 1990, his last tournament victory.

Like Spadea, Wilander came to Pinehurst as a wild-card entry. Had he not made the semifinals, he might have played in a legends event nearby this weekend.

“I think winning three matches, and especially winning a match like this today where I really didn’t feel good in the beginning and I wasn’t focused . . . it feels good to come back and know that I have the guts and whatever to stay with it,” he said.

Wilander will play top-seeded Todd Martin, the lone survivor from the run of upsets that marked the second round. Martin beat Fabrice Santoro, 6-3, 6-2. Martin and Wilander played last weekend in Atlanta, where Martin won in straight sets in the quarterfinals.

In the other semifinal, Jared Palmer will play Mark Woodforde.

Palmer, struggling to stay in the top 100, took a 6-3, 7-6 (7-5) victory over Francisco Clavet, and Woodforde won a match of left-handers against Franco Davin, 6-4, 7-5 (7-3).

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About the only sure things so far in an upset-filled Italian Open, top-seeded Conchita Martinez and No. 2 Martina Navratilova stayed on course with quarterfinal victories on clay in Rome.

Martinez, ranked No. 3 in the world and defending Italian Open champion, defeated eighth-seeded Nathalie Tauziat, 6-4, 6-4, and Navratilova eliminated No. 7 Naoko Sawamatsu, 6-2, 7-5.

In the semifinals, Martinez will play Karina Habsudova of Slovakia, who ended Italian hopes by beating Adriana Serra-Zannetti, 6-3, 6-2, in a match between qualifiers.

Navratilova will take on Irena Spirlea, who eliminated ninth-seeded Judith Wiesner, 6-0, 4-6, 6-3.

Spirlea had turned in the tournament’s major upset when she eliminated third-seeded Gabriela Sabatini in the second round. It was one of 10 upsets of seeded players going into the quarterfinals.

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Defending champion Michael Stich and fourth-seeded Andrei Medvedev struggled before winning three-set matches to reach the semifinals of the upset-ridden German Open in Hamburg.

Top-seeded Stich needed three match points before ousting ninth-seeded Carlos Costa, 6-4, 6-7 (7-3), 6-4. His quarterfinal opponent will be Yevgeni Kafelnikov, who has beaten Stich three consecutive times.

Kafelnikov, who has climbed from No. 109 to No. 29 this year, routed Richard Krajicek, 6-3, 6-2, after stunning third-seeded Goran Ivanisevic on Thursday.

Medvedev beat Magnus Gustafsson in just over two hours, 6-4, 4-6, 6-1, and will play Spain’s Javier Sanchez, who ousted Jacco Eltingh, 6-4, 6-2, in a match of unseeded players.