Skistar Swedish Open - Semifinals

5th seed Grigor Dimitrov is looking for his second ATP tour final.

The remaining two seeds, 5th seed Grigor Dimitrov and 8th seed Fernando Verdasco will clash in one semifinal, while two surprise semifinalists Thiemo de Bakker and Carlos Berlocq will fight it out for the other final berth. Dimitrov was pushed to three sets in his first two matches, but looked clinical in dispatching 3rd seed Juan Monaco 6-3, 6-2 in the quarterfinals. 8th seed Fernando Verdasco showed his quarterfinal run at Wimbledon was no fluke, reaching the semifinals of Bastad, including an upset win over 2nd seed Nicolas Almagro. de Bakker caused two big upsets over 6th seed Viktor Troicki and top seed Tomas Berdych. Berlocq defeated 7th seed Horacio Zeballos in the first round.

As usual, this part of this season wreaks havoc on my predictions as I only correctly predicted 1 semifinalist. I did say that upsets would be abound, though I didn't pick nearly enough and not the right ones. However, I did correctly pick 5 quarterfinalists in my predictions for Bastad. 

Thiemo de Bakker NED vs Carlos Berlocq ARG

With de Bakker's comeback accelerating, clay specialist Berlocq will need to come up with a special performance to knock off de Bakker. Berlocq's year is highlighted by a quarterfinal and a a semifinal, and now another ATP semifinal all coming on clay. de Bakker knocked off former top 20 player Viktor Troicki and world no.6 Tomas Berdych to reach the semifinals. 

Prediction: de Bakker in 3 sets

Elsewhere...
(5)Grigor Dimitrov over (8)Fernando Verdasco in 3 sets