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Tennis
Canas turns the tables on Kucera
By Nirmal Shekar
Top-seeded Guillermo Canas of Argentina exults after winning his semifinal against Karol Kucera in the Tata Open tennis tournament in Chennai on Saturday. - Photo: S. Mahinsha
CHENNAI, JAN. 5. For a while, Guillermo Canas' game resembled the state of his country's ecomony. Karol Kucera triggered a run on his bank of talent and he was alarmingly close to declaring bankruptcy.
But, obviously, Canas has better staying power these days than the Argentine currency. Showing tremendous resilience, the 24-year-old from Buenos Aires smartly turned things around after a poor start to power his way to the final.
Canas' 4-6, 6-3, 6-3 defeat of Kucera in two hours and 10 minutes steered him into Sunday's final, where an unlikely hero in the form of Paradorn Srichaphan of Thailand awaits him. Srichaphan breezed past fourth-seeded Andrei Pavel of Romania in the evening's first semifinal in straight sets.
Kucera started with the same sort of confidence and skills witch which he beat Fabrice Santoro in a three-hour thriller on Friday night. With deceptive backhand winners and superb returns of serve, the Slovakian pinned Canas down a long way behind the baseline.
The normally aggressive Argentine baseliner was forced to dig deeper than he had to all week here once he double faulted to breakpoint in the third game of the first set and then Kucera hit a forehand return winner to secure a break.
And things seemed to be going swimmingly for Kucera until the sixth game of the second set. That is where he gave it all away in a tearing hurry. Infuriatingly inconsistent, Kucera made two unforced errors on the backhand, one on the forehand and spiced that up with a double fault!
Often, you tend to think if this gifted, soft-spoken man's appeal comes from this very streak of vulnerability. Surely, for all the talent that he possesses, he is no invincible superman even when things are going well for him.
Vincibility wins friends and that is precisely why you saw the fans cheering even more vociferously for Kucera after he lost that service game in the second set.
What is more, he did break back immediately in the seventh game with a superb forehand return winner but only to give it away again in the next game with two errors from the baseline.
And once he took the second set, Canas, for the first time in this match, looked the part of the top seed, of a player who is ranked No. 14 in the world. He hit a breathtaking backhand down the line to force a volley error from Kucera to break the Slovakian in the very first game. From there, the only hiccup for Canas came when the lights went out for 15 minutes.
In the event, after looking down and out for about an hour, the gutsy Argentine picked himself off the floor wonderfully well to finally deliver the knockout punch and become the first top seed since Pat Rafter in 1998 to reach the final here.
Srichaphan kayoes Pavel
Andrei Pavel has never tried his hand _ or legs to be precise _ at kick boxing. But, then, even if he never did get into a ring to try out what is one of the most exotic sports practised anywhere in the world, the Romanian would remember the evening when he was dealt the sort of blows that resulted in a quick Thai boxing style knockout on a tennis court.
Playing perhaps his worst match ever in Chennai, and this on a day when Paradorn Srichaphan was hitting the ball as well as any journeyman pro would want to in his dreams, Pavel fell apart in a hurry as his game unravelled in quick time against the in-form Thai who raced to his first career ATP Tour final with a 6-3, 6-4 victory over the fourth seed in an hour and 14 minutes. Pavel was the third seed to fall to the Thai this week.
As Srichaphan brought his hands together for a namaste to the audience and then went down on his knees in a silent prayer, Asian tennis' finest moment in this championship was brought up by a charming, talented visitor from Bangkok rather than by a host country player.
If successive championships at this venue have done little to showcase Indian talent in singles _ barring the one event in 1998 when Leander Paes made the semifinals and lost a close match to the eventual champion Pat Rafter _ then few would have grudged Srichaphan's moment of glory this evening.
From the time he beat Max Mirnyi of Belarus in the first round, Srichaphan sounded out a warning to the big league players and has consistently played top class tennis to get where he finds himself now, a match victory away from his maiden title.
Things have come along nicely for Srichaphan since he made his way into the tournament as an alternative for Vladimir Voltchkov, who withdrew late last week. The amiable Thai came in here expecting nothing and has played with a freedom of spirit that has turned him into a crowd favourite.
Few Asian players of this era have displayed the sort of skills that Srichaphan has put on show this week. He hits the ball as hard as any player in the sport _ barring a handful _ has the tactical flexibility to deal with evolving situations on the court and, most of all, the perfect temperament to survive in the pressure cooker world of modern tennis.
To be sure, Pavel was a pathetic parody of the player we first celebrated in this city five years ago when he beat the then defending Wimbledon champion and top seed Richard Krajicek in the second round in 1997.
At least, then, he was a little known young man with stars in his eyes. Since then he has done enough to become a minor star himself, winning a Masters Series event, at Montreal, last year and finishing in the Top 30 for the third year in a row.
But, this evening, nothing went right for the Romanian who has made Germany his home, although he continues to play Davis Cup for his home nation. His forehand was all over the place _ it went everywhere except inside the rectangle. His backhand lacked power and depth, his serves were mostly mediocre and, most of all, his attitude was that of a whingeing, frustrated man who was on his way out.
Time after time, Pavel had a go at stationary balls in frustration and quite often bounced his racquet too on the court as improbable winners authored by an inspired opponent flew past him.
``I tried to put pressure on him. Instead he was the one who ended up putting pressure on me all the time,'' said a disappointed Pavel.
From the moment he lost his first service game of the match _ in the second game of the first set _ on a Srichaphan backhand pass, Pavel was a broken man. He fought off several breakpoints along the way to hold serve but Srichaphan served out the first set in 35 minutes.
About the only time Pavel suggested a revival was midway in the second set when he broke back to 3-3. But only to be distracted yet again by the crowd noise _ between first and second serves _ and his opponent's brilliance in the ninth game.
The Romanian double faulted to 15-40, fought off two breakpoints but fell to the third which was set up by the Thai with the shot of the match, a forehand crosscourt winner on the run threaded through the eye of a needle, beating an opponent who was at the net ready for the crosscourt forehand.
``This is just great. I am very happy. Things have worked very well for me here this week,'' said Srichaphan. ``The crowds are wonderful and I am enjoying myself.''
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