Jeremy Chardy and Julien Benneteau, two Frenchmen who have been solid members of the Top 50 for much of the last five years, both eased into the semi-finals of the Brest Challenger on Thursday.
Both men are now outside that group, with Chardy ranked at No.79 and Benneteau recovering from a long-term injury that caused him to miss much of the middle part of the season. Yet Chardy, the top seed this week, dismissed the in-form Canadian Steven Diez 6-1, 6-2. In a complete mis-match Chardy broke five times across the straight sets victory in a match lasting just over one hour. Diez did recover some pride by engineering a single break of the Chardy serve in the second set but could do little else to delay the top seed.
Julien Benneteau defeated Marko Tepavac 6-2, 6-1, and in so doing ensured his time of court lasted just under fifty minutes. Benneteau played a near-perfect match on serve, dropping no points from sixteen in the first set, and dropping just two in the second. Two breaks of the Tepavac serve in the first set followed by three in the second ensured a one-sided victory for the Frenchman.
Those looking for a shock win and pulsating encounter were not disappointed when second seed Lukas Lacko and lucky loser Norbert Gombos took to the court in an all Slovakian encounter. Gombos has suffered a somewhat disappointing 2016 season so far, but strong recent performances have seen him climb back towards the top 200. The 6’5 Gombos recovered from the loss of the first to defeat his compatriot 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 in one hour and fifty-six minutes. Gombos survived eighteen aces from the Lacko racket, breaking three times from his five opportunities in the final two sets to reach his third Challenger semi-final of recent weeks.
The final quarter-final saw Yannik Reuter defeat Aldin Setkic 6-2, 6-4. Reuter produced an assured display, offering no break points to the Bosnian and creating eleven of his own. The Belgian capitalised on three of them. Reuter will battle top seed Jeremy Chardy, though despite his good run is unlikely to cause the top seed undue problems.
Julien Benneteau will then face Norbert Gombos in what is likely to be a very close affair, though Benneteau might just be considered the favourite given his former top 100 history.
