LOS ANGELES(AP) Leonardo Mayer advanced to the semifinals of the LA Tennis Open when No. 2 seed Mardy Fish withdrew with an abdominal strain on Friday.
Mayer will face Carsten Bell, who beat John Isner 6-4, 6-4. Isner played with a brace on the left ankle that he twisted late in his tiebreaker win over Marcos Baghdatis on Wednesday.
The other semifinal will feature Sam Querrey and the winner of the match between Tommy Haas and No. 1 seed Marat Safin.
Fish, who had beaten Chris Guccione in a long three-set match Thursday night, said that when he served he still was being bothered by an oblique muscle he had strained while playing Davis Cup against Croatia in early July and decided it was wiser to withdraw than risk further injury and possibly miss the bulk of the hard court season and the U.S. Open.
Fish said he also had to consider that this is a lower-level ATP 250 tournament, which means a maximum of 250 ranking points are available, and the events coming up offer more reward or more penalty should he be unable to defend the points he earned by reaching the finals at New Haven and the quarterfinals of the Open last year.
The way the ranking system is set up now for us and for the guys that finished in the top 30 last year,'' said Fish, who's No. 21 this week.It puts a lot of weight on the 500 (point) tournaments and the (1,000-point) Masters Series events and obviously the Grand Slams (wit a maximum of 2,000 points). Those are the big ones for somebody like me and I need to be healthy for those. Sometimes you've got to be selfish and that's unfortunate.''