By Sandra Harwitt

If you need further proof that the men’s game is skewing older just look at the collection of semifinalists from the Exxonmobil Open in Doha, Qatar.

Three of the four semifinalist playing on Friday are from the over-30 crowd: Ivo Karlovic of Croatia is the oldest guy at 35, David Ferrer of Spain is 32, Andreas Seppi of Italy is 30. And not to hurt the morale of Tomas Berdych of the Czech Republic but he’s almost a 30-something himself at 29 and counting — he’ll turn 30 on September 17th of this year.

Proving that the oldsters can meet with some great success take on board that Karlovic’s three-set quarterfinal upset of world No. 1 Novak Djokovic on Thursday makes him the oldest player to have his way with a top-ranked guy since a 39-year-old Ken Rosewall  beat fellow Australian John Newcombe at Wimbledon in 1974.