Chennai: There can’t be a sweeter revenge than which happened here today at Nungambakkam Tennis Stadium. Karol Kucera can now wipe out memories of his semi-final loss at the Tata Open here last year, as today he showed the defending champion and top seed Guillermo Canas of Argentina the door in straight sets.

Kucera bowed out last year to Canas, but the 6-1, 7-5 win that earned the Slovak a semi-final berth, this time around has leveled the score in more ways than one. The popular top seed looked completely out of sorts today, and the first set saw him struggling against a much lower ranked opponent. But it was Kucera’s day. The Slovak got everything right and his baseline game, with superb crosscourt winners left Canas with no chance. Kucera broke Canas in the first and third games to race to a 3-0 lead and then, just for the sake of emphasis, broke again in the seventh to win the set at 6-1. But in the second set, Canas did try to fight back. Though down by a break (second game), he brought back parity by breaking Kucera in the fifth game. The ninth game saw Kucera struggling to hold serve but in the end, he managed not only to hold but never looked back from there. He broke Canas in the 12th game to win the set at (7-5), becoming the first player to romp into the semi-finals. Sixth-seed Rainer Schuettler, who brought about an upset of sorts by sending back the ‘Scud’ Mark Philippoussis yesterday, also succumbed to French Jean-Rene Lisnard 2-6, 5-7.

But for Paradorn Srichaphan things went according to the script as he brushed aside Sargis Sargisan of Armenia 6-4, 6-4. The first set was easy, but in the second he was given a scare of sorts when he was down a break at 0-3.

Easy for Bhupathi: It just couldn’t have been easier for Mahesh Bhupathi and Todd Woodbridge. The top seeds just swept aside the German duo Karsten Braasch and Rainer Schuettler 6-2, 6-1 to enter the semi-finals here.