World #1 Novak Djokovic booked his place in his 18th consecutive Major semifinal by beating Mikhail Youzhny under the lights in New York tonight, 6-3, 6-2, 3-6, 6-0.
The Russian Youzhny, who was coming off a long and valiant 5-set win over Lleyton Hewitt, came up with break points in the first game of the match, but failed to capitalize. Djokovic then broke immediately on Youzhny’s first service game. The Russian tried to hang close, but looked under-inspired, and never found a way into the Djokovic serve, either in the first, or the second sets.
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In the fourth game of the third set, however, after a fantastic get on a drop volley at 1-2 on Djokovic’s serve, Youzhny energized both himself and the crowd. He finally converted his 8th break point chance for a 3-1 lead. The fans in the stadium, clearly wanting to see a real match, got behind the Russian, which seemed to rattle the Serbian favorite, who began to spray errors. Djokovic broke back from 0-40 down, for 3-4 in the 7th game, but then double-faulted away his hold game for 3-5. It was a surprisingly passive and poor game from Djokovic that gave Youzhny the third set on his serve.
In the fourth, however, all the accumulated effort seemed to have left the Russian with nothing, and Djokovic appeared to have righted the ship. Youzhny failed to win a single game.
Djokovic will play Stan Wawrinka in the semifinals, who upset the defending champion Andy Murray earlier today.