Roddick's replacement has eyes on semifinals slot

London : With one more match to go in the preliminary round-robin stages, Sweden's Robin Soderling is already setting his eyes on his semifinal opponent at the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals.

"I think the answer is pretty obvious," Soderling said when asked who he would not like to play in Saturday's semifinals.

"I played Roger [Federer] many, many times. For every time he beat me, I think I will get closer to a win, so we'll see as there is not much I can do about the results in the other group," the 25-year-old said.

Coming in as the last-minute replacement for injured Andy Roddick, Soderling has been in ominous form convincingly winning both his singles — against the World's No2 and 3 players — Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic.

Technically, he has not even qualified for this competition. But as the World No9, Soderling was the first option after Roddick pulled out due to the knee injury he sustained during the Shanghai Masters last month. ]

He still has to play against World No6 Nikolay Davydenko, who kept alive his hopes for a last four place after sweeping past Rafael Nadal in straight sets late on Wednesday.

Rewriting history

And as such, Soderling sits at the doorstep of re-writing history to a certain extent as the last Swede to qualify and play at three round-robin matches. It was Soderling's coach Magnus Norman who ended with a 0-3 record in 2000.

Thomas Enqvist is the last Swede to actually win a match at this event following an early exit with a 1-2 record from the 1999 edition.

Thomas Johansson also filled in as an alternate in 2002 and played just one match, losing to Federer.

Long road ahead"It's still a long way to go. I heard someone told me that I'm already through to the semis. I will focus on my next match before that," Soderling said.

"I don't think I am even halfway through here. I still have to win against at least two more great players here," he added.

He admitted that he has never allowed himself to be pressurised by the presence of big names at any event.

Djokovic tips soderling

Pre-tournament favourite Novak Djokovic has tipped rank outsider Robin Soderling at the year-ending Barclays ATP World Tour Finals being played here at the O2 this weekend.

"He has won four straight sets and absolutely deserves to qualify for the semifinals. I think he's the best player so far in the tournament," Djokovic said after his first loss on Wednesday.

The Serb, who is the defending champion, had come to London with the tag of being the red-hot favourite after winning three of the four tournaments he has played recently. In the past month, Djokovic accounted for Soderling on two occasions — the semifinals in Beijing and the quarterfinals at the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 event in Paris more recently. "Well, he has nothing to lose as this is his first Masters Cup," Djokovic said.