CASABLANCA, Morocco (AP)—Stanislas Wawrinka of Switzerland and Potito Starace of Italy won in straight sets Friday to reach the semifinals of the Grand Prix Hassan II.
The top-seeded Wawrinka beat Moroccan wild card Reda El Amrani 6-3, 6-1 and will next play Starace, who upset fourth-seeded Lukasz Kubot of Poland 6-1, 6-0. It will be Starace’s first ATP tour semifinal since 2008 at Kitzbuhel, Austria.
Wawrinka won six straight games and landed 88 percent of first serves, without allowing a break chance to El Amrani.
El Amrani served eight double faults, including one to give Wawrinka a 4-2 lead in the first set.
In the opening set, Starace broke Kubot twice and then saved three break points to lead 5-0. Kubot won only four points on serve in the second set.
Last year’s runner-up, Florent Serra of France, defeated second-seeded Guillermo Garcia-Lopez of Spain 6-2, 6-2.
Serra broke twice in each set and will take on third-seeded Victor Hanescu of Romania, who downed Richard Gasquet of France 7-6 (3), 4-6, 6-3.
Hanescu jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the first-set tiebreaker. Gasquet broke Hanescu at 4-4 in the following set to level.
In the final set, Hanescu saved four break points in the opening game before breaking for a 3-1 lead.