Raonic Advances to Second Straight Final at BetLM

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Cana­dian Milos Raonic needed only 75 min­utes to beat
Ben­jamin Becker of Ger­many 6–4, 6–4 Sat­ur­day in the semi­fi­nals of the Regions
Mor­gan Kee­gan Cham­pi­onships and reach his sec­ond final in as many weeks.

Raonic won at San Jose last week and is 15–1 in match play this year. Ranked
35th in the world, the ATP World Tour’s first mul­ti­ple win­ner this sea­son will
try to win his third title Sun­day against Aus­trian Jur­gen Melzer, a 6–4, 3–6,
6–3 win­ner over No. 3 seed Radek Stepanek.

“It’s a big thing, espe­cially after the way I’ve been play­ing,” said
Raonic, who lost a three-set final here last year to Andy Rod­dick on a div­ing
shot on match point.

“I think I’m a much bet­ter player, and I’ve matured a lot so I’ve given
myself the oppor­tu­nity a lot bet­ter. I felt last year I was more so squeez­ing
through the matches and just rid­ing the con­fi­dence from San Jose. … This year
I feel like I’ve been com­ing out of the matches the bet­ter player. And also I
have improved. I’m a bet­ter player than I was a year ago.”

Results bear that out.

The big-serving Raonic has won nine straight matches in straight sets with
66 aces here in Mem­phis. He has held serve in 40 of his 41 games at the event
and was so dom­i­nant and effi­cient that Becker scored only five points off
Raonic’s serve in each set. Raonic won 29 of his 31 points off his first serve.

On the women’s side, Sofia Arvids­son of Swe­den won her sec­ond career title
by defeat­ing Marina Erakovic of New Zealand 6–3, 6–4 Sat­ur­day night in the
Mem­phis Inter­na­tional. Arvidsson’s first title came here in 2006, and she also
was a runner-up to Maria Shara­pova in Mem­phis in 2010.

Arvids­son said she felt no pres­sure play­ing in a final after her prac­tice
partner’s 4-year-old god­son died Fri­day of can­cer back in Swe­den. Her hit­ting
part­ner returned home ear­lier this week.

“I was quite relaxed,” Arvids­son said. “If I lose, it’s just a ten­nis
match.”

Becker, play­ing in his first semi­fi­nal since Bangkok in Octo­ber 2010, had
not dropped a set here after being side­lined for six months last year because of
an injured left elbow. He felt Raonic’s strength in the eighth game of the
sec­ond set when the Cana­dian held serve with a 139 mph ace that hit Becker in
the back.

“It just hap­pens when you move toward the T,” Becker said. “He serves so
fast it’s tough to react.”

Raonic said he always apol­o­gizes when his serves hit some­one in the crowd or
a ball boy.

“When I hit my oppo­nent, I say sorry. But I’m not as sorry,” Raonic said.

Each held serve through the first eight games. Then Raonic broke when the
Ger­man was serv­ing at 15–30 and hit his two-handed back­hand into the net on
con­sec­u­tive points. Raonic served out with a pair of aces to take the first set.

The Cana­dian started the sec­ond set by break­ing Becker in Game 1. Becker
double-faulted down love-15 and didn’t score a point off his serve before
hit­ting a fore­hand wide.

Becker at least held off Raonic’s match point by chal­leng­ing what appeared
to be a 127 mph ace for the win. Replay showed the ball landed just past the end
line, but Becker’s return on the next serve bounced short of the net.

“Very tough because the odds are he doesn’t miss very much from the back,“
Becker said. “He has always one or two ser­vice games from my side where he
doesn’t miss. He moves quite well for his size, so it’s tough to actu­ally get
him off bal­ance as well. If you don’t play aggres­sive, he gets his chances and
he used them today too.”

Melzer ousted top seed John Isner in straight sets to reach the semi­fi­nals.
With his win over Stepanek, Melzer reached his fourth final in the United States
and first since 2007 when he lost in Las Vegas to Lley­ton Hewitt.

“Well, it’s obvi­ously very sat­is­fy­ing,” Melzer said.

“I’ve played a great tour­na­ment so far, and reach­ing that final is
some­thing spe­cial. I haven’t played a final since 2010. It was a tough match
today. I mean he’s obvi­ously a tricky player. He knows what to do on the court,
very offen­sive at times, just takes back a lit­tle bit the speed of his stroke. I
had to stay focused. I had to play my game.”

Melzer helped Aus­tria advance past Rus­sia in the first round of the Davis
Cup two weeks ago and came to Mem­phis early. He broke his toe when he got caught
in a hotel bed­spread Feb. 16. Melzer has been icing the toe after each match,
and he said the injury only both­ers him now when he sprints and stops.

“But the good thing is most of my slid­ing I do on hard court I do with my
left foot so it doesn’t … affect my game,” Melzer said.

He improved to 8–3 this year and came to Mem­phis 38th in the world after
back trou­bles knocked him down after he reached his career-best No. 8 rank­ing
last spring. He opened this year with con­sec­u­tive first-round losses in Bris­bane
and the Aus­tralian Open before qual­i­fy­ing in Zagreb and reach­ing the
quar­ter­fi­nals.

Melzer remains unde­feated against Stepanek, though this was their first
match that went three sets. Melzer broke Stepanek in the sev­enth game of the
first set when the Czech double-faulted at deuce and when Melzer had the
advan­tage, putting the Aus­trian up 4–3. Melzer then served out for the first
set.

“When you lose a match like that you know you have your chances,” said
Stepanek, who only decided to play in Mem­phis on Tues­day after being ill. “I
gave him a Christ­mas gift in the first set. You know it was a very poor ser­vice
game of mine.”