Third seed Roberto Bautista Agut powered past Croatia’s Borna Coric in straight sets to reach the semi-finals of the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships.

Bautista Agut overcame a slow start to outclass his opponent 7-6 (7- 4) 6-4 and stay in the hunt for his second title of the season.

The Auckland Classic champion now takes on wildcard Malek Jaziri for a place in the final after the Tunisian defeated Stefanos Tsitsipas, 6-4 3-6 6-3.

“I think I played very good tennis,” Bautista Agut said.

“It was not easy to beat Borna… he’s very solid. He was hitting very good serves and playing very aggressively. I didn’t rest all match.”

Bautista Agut, who trailed 3-1 early in the contest, fought back to claim the opening set in the tiebreak. He then won a decisive break at 4-4 in the second set and pushed on to reach his first Dubai semi-final.

Jaziri recovered from losing the second set to pull away to reach his third semi-final on the Tour.

“It’s a great feeling,” Jaziri said. “I am playing the best tennis of my life.”

Second seed Lucas Pouille battled back after losing the first set to Japan’s Yuichi Sugita to win 3-6 6-3 6-2.

French second seed Pouille, who fired two aces in the final game to extend his total on the night to 14, will on Friday play for a place in the final against either seventh seeded Serb Filip Krajinovic or Russian Evgeny Donskoy, who upset Roger Federer in the 2017 second round.

“I knew it would be a tough one, he’s won plenty of matches in the past six, seven months. He’s a very good player,” Pouille said.

“I knew I had to play some good tennis to win.”