KEN DOHERTY hopes to make it third time lucky when he meets John Higgins in the semi-finals of the Liverpool Victoria Charity Challenge today.

Doherty's best-of-11 frames meeting with the world champion at Derby's Assembly Rooms will be his third semi-final in as many weeks.

But the Irish number one has yet to turn any of those appearances into title-winning campaigns.

He lost to Higgins in the final of the Benson and Hedges Masters and went out in the last four of the Scottish Open a week ago to Graeme Dott.

But after a 5-4 success over Hong Kong's Marco Fu yesterday afternoon the world number four said: "It's great to be in another semi but it's time I won a tournament again."

"It gets harder to take with every defeat. I'm sure a lot of other players would settle for getting this far but that's not the way I see it."

Fu, who knocked out Irish and Welsh Open champion Mark Williams in the last round, almost caused another upset.

He trailed 3-0 scoring just five points in frames two and three. However, it was Doherty's turn to be on the receiving end in the next four frames.

Fu (21) allowed the Dubliner only 17 points as he replied with breaks of 45, 102, 68 and 31.

Doherty tied the scores at 4-4 thanks to a run of 67 and was always in control of the decider.

"I was very impressed with Marco because he came back really well, Doherty said."

Details in SPORTS ROUND-UP