Broady's Ningbo Charge: Brit battles past Delaney to secure semi-final spot

Liam Broady made his way into his fifth semi-final of the season as he beat Australia's Jake Delaney 6-1, 7-6 in the Ningbo Challenger. This is the Brit's third Challenger level semi-final of the season, with all of them taking place in Asia.

Despite this not being a main tour match, there was a lot at stake for Broady. The affirmation that his tennis was heading in the right direction but also he came in as the favourite against the World No.356 Delaney.

Broady came out firing in the first set and basically salvaged the first break of serve by relying on locking down the errors and making the bigger hitter work hard. Nothing fancy from the Brit, but it was almost like watching the old version of Broady in terms of the brand of tennis. Make yourself hard to beat.

The slight change for Liam in comparison to his previous victory over Honda was that he was forced to compete more in his own service games. It was only fractional but there was definitely a change to adjust to here.

The double break came relatively quickly for Broady. One thing he did do efficiently and effectively at the beginning was stretch out the bigger man through immaculate angles and width creation. In many ways it is an obvious tactical ploy from the Brit but for someone who is limited on weaponry and power this really needs to happen.

At this point, Broady is absolutely charging to the finish line without that much difficulty. Even on the set point, he is not under any duress here. Broady is more than happy to settle into some form of survival tennis on the back foot as he is giving Delaney enough backhand volume to eventually extract the error on a longer point. Longer exchanges favour the Brit versus most players, but in this quarter-final it was more about where he was going in those longer points.

The second set was considerably different to the first. The Australian raised his level and he was proving to be more of a dangerous proposition from the ground by a country mile. Most of the threat revolved around serve and forehand, naturally, but he was also adjusting to the type of ball that Broady was giving him better. Broady did not start the second set well, but crucially, he did not get broken.

Delaney was rolling through service games with more regularity going into the tiebreak. That is why the way the passage of play transpired on the opening point of the tiebreak was so large. The Brit executes an immense blocked return of serve to ensure he can at least begin the point. He ultimately he gives himself a chance and gets rewarded for it as Delaney netted from the following ball. Once again from the backhand side. The complexion of the match flipped again. Broady negated one big serve and then gave nothing away for the remainder.

Broady takes control of the tiebreak through prioritising being extremely solid, kinda going back to basics while also pressurising backhand. He did this more so through repetitive patterns and searching for it in positions of trouble. Either way, he generally had the better of the Aussie in those duels. This came to fruition on the match point as Broady sealed his place into another Challenger semi-final.

It has been nice to see Broady build some proper form this week as his confidence has been low in recent months. Now he puts himself in a position of being at the business-end of a tournament once again. Two steps away from a second Challenger title of the season and fourth overall. Can he do it?