THE CANADIAN PRESS
TORONTO -- Emerging from a side of the bracket that featured Roger Federer, Nikolay Davydenko, Andy Roddick and James Blake are two Rogers Cup semifinalists: Nicolas Kiefer and Gilles Simon.
Seems hard to believe, huh?
"I mean, I didn't even know what's happening," said Simon, the 22nd-ranked Frenchman who defeated Croatia's Marin Cilic 3-6, 6-2, 6-3 at the $2.6-million tournament on Friday. "I'm just so confident, I want to win every match, even if I'm tired. I know I'm playing very good at the moment, so I want to try to win the more matches I can to have the better ranking at the end of the week.
"Because you know, when you play tennis, sometimes after you can be injured or something like this and the confidence (can) just go away like this.
"So I'm just trying to play with this and to win all the matches I can."
Germany's Kiefer dispatched Blake 6-1, 6-2. He said the win over the seventh-seeded American wasn't quite as straight-forward as it looked.
"It wasn't easy," he said. "Maybe it looks easy, but I also have to play (at a) very high level."
The 37th-ranked player hasn't won an ATP tournament since 2000, in Hong Kong.
But Simon wisely isn't taking anything for granted.
"I just hope that we are going to play a great match with a great fight," Simon said. "Even if I died on the court, yeah, I'll just give the maximum tomorrow."
Simon, 23, adds Cilic to his list of victims at the tournament, which already included top seed Federer, American qualifier Donald Young and Argentina's Jose Acasuso.
This match was far from a classic. The players combined for 104 unforced errors, including 64 by Cilic. The 19-year-old fired 37 winners, while Simon connected on just 15 -- but that's his game. He kept the ball in play and waited for Cilic to make mistakes, which he frequently did.
"When you play slowly, we could say that he missed some easy shots because he just doesn't manage to finish the point himself," Simon said. "He needs the speed of the opponent. That's why he had a very good start.
"Then I just wanted, yeah, to put the ball inside on the backhand five, six, seven, 10 times. But I didn't want to change that, because sometimes he's a little bit impatient and he's trying some shots he shouldn't try and giving some points."
The match didn't quite capture the imaginations of the centre-court fans at the Rexall Centre, who were relatively quiet throughout the match.
"Let's go Federer," jeered one onlooker during the second set.
Federer's gone, but there will be two big names playing in the semifinal on the other side of the bracket.
Later Friday, second seed Rafael Nadal of France will play 10th-seeded Frenchman Richard Gasquet, while third seed Novak Djokovic of Serbia will take on eighth seed Andy Murray of Britain for those spots.
In doubles action, Toronto's Daniel Nestor and Serbian partner Nenad Zimonjic have moved on to the semifinals.
The No. 2 seeds defeated France's Paul-Henri Mathieu and Russia's Mikhail Youzhny 7-6 (4), 6-4.
They'll play seventh seeds Lukas Dlouhy of the Czech Republic and Leander Paes of India in the next round.
Cilic leaves the tournament having made a mark. The 44th-ranked youngster defeated sixth-seeded Roddick, 12th-seeded Spaniard Tommy Robredo and Czech qualifier Lukas Dlouhy in an impressive run to the quarter-finals.
Simon said Cilic should play a bit more aggressive.
"Maybe if he comes more often to the net, if he's coming not every time, but, yes, one point he come and one point he stay, then for the opponent it's harder," he said. "But he's just playing from the baseline and he never comes to the net. Even when you're far from the ball you just put the ball inside and you run, you run until he misses."
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