Top seed and defending champion Stanislas Wawrinka punctured the challenge of Benoit Paire with remarkable ease and earned himself a shot at a third successive Chennai Open title by reaching the singles final, here on Saturday.
Wawrinka literally walked into the summit clash. With a dominating 6-3, 6-4 win over the French third seed in the semifinals of the $482,085 hard court tournament.
“It’s never easy against him. He was serving well, I needed to play my best against him. His backhand was also good,” Wawrinka said.
Down a breakpoint in first set, Paire hit the ball into the net to hand Wawrinka a 4-2 lead. The top seed closed out the set in the ninth game.
In the second set too, Wawrinka started well by breaking Paire in third game. He held his own without any trouble to give himself a 3 -1 cushion and won the match in 10th game.
Wawrinka will now face the French third seed Borna Coric, who had to dig deep into his reserves to beat a fighting Aljaz Bedene 7-6(5), 6-7(5), 6-3 in a marathon semifinal that lasted close to three hours.
Stan praises Ramkumar
After the match Wawrinka says India’s Ramkumar Ramanathan will not have to worry about his rankings if could continue to perform the way he did this week.
In a sparkling show, Ramkumar beat a top-100 player before giving a scare to world number 45 Aljaz Bedene in the quarterfinals.
“I watched his game last night on television for some time. He played well yesterday with great attitude. His forehands are very good. If he continue to play like this for an year on tours and challengers, Ramkumar will improve on his rankings also,” Wawrinka said.