3rd seed Spaniard David Ferrer defeated his countryman Feliciano Lopez as he survived two match points to win in three sets 6-7 (4)  7-6 (7)  6-3 and moved into the Barcelona Open semifinals.

There were no break points in the first set until the 12th game, when Ferrer had a setpoint on Lopez’s serve, but couldn’t convert. It was Lopez who got the upper hand in the tiebreak and took a 1-0 set lead.

Both players were strong on their serves in set 2, and this time it was Lopez who had the first two break point and match point opportunities at 5-4 up. Ferrer did well to save both of them and a tiebreak was to decide a faith of the second set too. Lopez had one more matchpoint at 7-6, but Ferrer once more averted it and forced a decider.

Ferrer managed to take his opponent’s serve in the sixth game of the third set to go 4-2 up. As there were no more breaks  till the end, Ferrer set up a semifinal match against Canadian Raonic, who surprisingly beat British no.1 Murray 6-4  7-6 (3).

Also through to the last 4 is another Spaniard Fernando Verdasco after his opponent Kei Nishikori of Japan surrendered the match at 4-2 in Verdasco’s favour.

Verdasco will meet the defending champion Rafael Nadal in Saturday’s semifinal. Nadal defeated Janko Tipsarevic of Serbia 6-2  6-2 to make it to the last 4.