TENNIS in DEPTH.

All three players earned their spots for the tournament in London after Berdych beat Janko Tipsarevic of Serbia 7-5, 6-4 Thursday in the third round of the Paris Masters. Tipsarevic needed to win the title in Paris to qualify for the season-ending event, which starts on Nov. 20.

Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, Andy Murray and David Ferrer have already qualified for the tournament for the top eight players in the world.

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With three spots still up for grabs in the chase to the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals, the fate of several players’ year-end championships hopes will come down to their performances this week. No. 6 Tomas Berdych, No. 7 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, and No. 8 Mardy Fish all control their own destiny – reach the final and they’re guaranteed a berth to London. Nicolas Almagro (9th) and Janko Tipsarevic (11th) each need to make the final to have a shot at qualifying. Frenchmen Gilles Simon (12th) and Gael Monfils (14th) have to win the title to keep their hopes alive.

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Two Barclays ATP World Tour Finals hopefuls, Tomas Berdych and Mardy Fish, both fell at the first hurdle. The fourth-seeded Berdych bowed out 3-6, 6-3, 6-2 to Japan’s Kei Nishikori, who recently became the highest-ranked Japanese player in history. The 21 year old scored a Top 10 win for a second straight tournament, having also beaten Jo-Wilfried Tsonga en route to his first ATP World Tour Masters 1000 semi-final in Shanghai. ”I’m really happy the way I played today,” said World No. 32 Nishikori. “It was a slow start for me, but getting rhythm in the second set and playing really well in the third, so I’m really happy.

Earlier in the day, No. 5 seed Fish retired due to a left hamstring injury after one game of his match against fellow American James Blake. Berdych and Fish respectively hold down the No. 6 and No. 8 spots in the South African Airways 2011 ATP Year-To-Date Rankings and will be looking to maintain their places in the Top 8 at the conclusion of the regular season next week in Paris.

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Roger Federer and number two seed Rafael Nadal both crashed out at the quarter-final stage of the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati, while world number one Novak Djokovic had to come from behind to beat Gael Monfils. Federer, a four-time champion and unbeaten at the tournament since 2008, slumped to a 6-2 7-6 (7-3) defeat to eighth seed Tomas Berdych in a match lasting just over 90 minutes. The defeat was a significant blow to Federer’s US Open preparations, and came against an opponent whom he had beaten in nine of 12 previous meetings, though to whom he lost in last year’s Wimbledon semi-final. Federer was not able to fashion a single break point opportunity on the booming Berdych serve, and was broken twice himself in the first set. Berdych held firm in the second before skating through the tie-break.

Berdych will play Djokovic in the semi-final after seeing off Monfils in three sets. Djokovic surrendered the first set 3-6 but took the next two 6-4 and 6-3 to progress.

Nadal was beaten 6-3 6-4 by improving American Mardy Fish, aiming to reach his second straight Cincinnati final, who sent down 10 aces en route to what was his first win over the Spaniard. Nadal, who had come through a marathon battle with Fernando Verdasco in the previous round, was playing with two fingers heavily bandaged after a freak accident in a restaurant. Fish will next face fourth seed Andy Murray, who avoided the travails of his two big-name rivals as he eased to a 6-3 6-3 win over Frenchman Gilles Simon. Murray broke the Frenchman four times to reach the last four.

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Local favourite Robin Soderling eased into the semi-finals of the Swedish Open with a 6-3 6-4 victory over number eight seed Potito Starace. The top-seeded Swede lost just 10 points on serve all match, and will now face third-seed Tomas Berdych for a place in Sunday’s final. 2010 Wimbledon runner up Berdych enjoyed an equally-comfortable passage into the last four as he ousted Slovenia’s Blaz Kavcic 6-1 6-4.

World number six David Ferrer also advanced by beating Austria’s Andreas Haider-Maurer 6-1 6-1. The Spanish right-hander will meet compatriot Nicolas Almagro for a place in the final after he defeated Sweden’s Andreas Ryderstedt 6-4 7-6 (7-4). Defending champion Almagro and Ryderstedt both had to complete their second-round matches earlier on Friday after they were suspended because of rain. Ryderstedt beat Spain’s Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo 6-4 6-2 and Almagro defeated fellow Spaniard Guillermo Olaso 6-2 6-3.

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Rafael Nadal survived some hairy moments to see off the challenge of Gilles Muller and progress into the second week of Wimbledon. The defending champion, facing the man who sent him packing from SW19 in 2005, could easily have lost the first two sets on tie-breaks as Muller went close to playing – or at least serving – him off Court One. But Nadal came through both of them, one before the rain that called time on the match on Friday evening and one on Saturday, to move into the fourth round with a 7-6 (8/6) 7-6 (7/5) 6-0 victory. However, the Mallorcan will spend his day off on Sunday knowing he was in a real battle with the world number 96 from Luxembourg, and, had he not saved two set points in the first set, things may well have turned out differently. Having taken the tensest of openers on Friday night, Nadal left the court for treatment following a tumble but did not return until today as the weather intervened and forced play to be cancelled at 7pm. He showed no obvious signs of discomfort as he returned to the court, but if his body was not troubling him then Muller certainly was.

Monfils was sent crashing out of Wimbledon, beaten 6-3 3-6 6-3 6-3 by Poland’s Lukasz Kubot. Their match resumed on Court Three at one set all and 3-3 on Saturday after being bit by bad weather on Friday. Tomas Berdych, last year’s beaten Wimbledon finalist, cruised into the fourth round with an easy win over Alex Bogomolov Jr. The sixth seed from the Czech Republic saw off his American opponent 6-2 6-4 6-3 on Court 18. Berdych, 25, beat six-time champion Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic at the All England Club in 2010 before losing to eventual champion Rafael Nadal. In the fourth round, he will face another American, 10th seed Mardy Fish. Fish progressed after third round opponent Robin Haase of the Netherlands retired with an injury, with the score at 6-3 6-7 (5-7) 6-2 1-1.

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Tomas Berdych became the most high-profile casualty of the French Open to date as he fell to French qualifier Stephane Robert in five sets. The Czech eighth seed, who beat Andy Murray en route to the semi-finals in 2010, raced into a two-set lead. But 31-year-old Robert, ranked 140th, came back to win 3-6 3-6 6-2 6-2 9-7 in three hours and 23 minutes.

Elsewhere, Juan Martin del Potro, Mikhail Youzhny, Viktor Troicki and Thomaz Bellucci all posted victories. It was, however, Robert’s stunning triumph over 25-year-old Berdych that stole the headlines. The right-hander had never previously won a match at Roland Garros and this was only his second win in eight Grand Slam appearances. It was also only his second win of the season on the ATP World Tour and earned him a second-round meeting with Italy’s Fabio Fognini, who overcame Denis Istomin 6-4 6-2 6-2.

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Robin Soderling saved three match points before winning his second-round clash at the Rome Masters on Tuesday. Soderling had made a disastrous start, slipping a double-break down and sacrificing the opening set, and looked down and out in the second when Verdasco served for the match before rallying for an unlikely win.

Seventh seed Tomas Berdych eased past Argentina’s Juan Monaco 6-2 6-2, while 16th seed Richard Gasquet needed just 62 minutes to beat Russian qualifier Igor Andreev 6-1 6-2. Lucky loser Jarkko Nieminen also advanced to round three. In first-round action, Marin Cilic won his all-Croatian battle with Ivo Karlovic when Karlovic was forced to retire with a back problem trailing 6-4 1-0.

Kevin Anderson also withdrew injured when he trailed 7-6 (7-1) 1-0 to Sam Querrey. Ninth seed Nicolas Almagro marked his debut in the world’s top 10 with an emphatic 6-0 7-5 win over Italian wild card Simone Bolelli, taking the first set in just 22 minutes.

Fourteenth seed Stanislas Wawrinka came from behind to beat Fabio Fognini 6-7 (7-5) 6-2 6-4, while Ivan Ljubicic, Juan Ignacio Chela and Feliciano Lopez were also first-round winners.

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