TENNIS ROUNDUP : Slumping Graf Finally Advances to a Semifinal

Steffi Graf, seeking to end a slump that has cost her the No. 1 ranking, hasn’t advanced past the quarterfinals since last November.

So her 6-3, 6-1 victory Friday over Meredith McGrath might have been easy, but it wasn’t quite as routine as it appeared.

It moved Graf, eliminated in the quarterfinals of her two previous tournaments this year, into today’s semifinals of a $500,000 tournament at Boca Raton, Fla.

The top-seeded German will play No. 8 Nathalie Tauziat next. Tauziat beat injured Mary Joe Fernandez, seeded third, 6-1, 7-5.

The other bracket will pit 14-year-old Jennifer Capriati, seeded fourth, against Gabriela Sabatini, seeded second.

Capriati defeated Claudia Porwik of Germany, 6-1, 6-4, and Sabatini beat Regina Rajchrtova of Czechoslovakia, 6-2, 6-2.

Top-seeded Jonas Svensson beat fellow Swede Christian Bergstrom, 6-4, 7-5, to reach the semifinals of the $150,000 Copenhagen Open.

Svensson will play third-seeded Jakob Hlasek of Switzerland, who rallied after losing the first set to defeat unseeded Christian Saceanu of Germany, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4.

Anders Jarryd of Sweden and No. 6 Todd Woodbridge of Australia will meet in the other semifinal.