THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
DELRAY BEACH, Fla. -- Mardy Fish advanced to the final of the Delray Beach International Championships with a 6-4, 6-1 victory against Jeremy Chardy on Saturday night.
Fish, the top seed, will try to become the first No. 1 seed to in the 17-year history of this tournament to take the title when he faces qualifier Evgeny Korolev on Sunday.
Korolev reached his first career final with a 6-1, 7-5 win over Christophe Rochus in Saturday's first semifinal match.
Fish was facing a break point to go behind 1-4 before taking control of the match.
"I've never seen him play," said the American, who served and volleyed Chardy off the court in winning 11 of the last 13 games. "I didn't know any of his patterns, ins and outs."
Fish is 2-10 in finals, including a loss at San Jose, Calif., earlier this month.
"I played great the second set," he said. "Even the game he won I had a game point."
Korolev is the second consecutive qualifier to secure a final berth at this tournament. Kei Nishikori won the championship but did not attempt to defend his title this year.
"I'm very happy I won," Korolev said. "Every tournament you play you hope to win it."
The 105th-ranked Korolev is the fourth qualifier to reach the Delray Beach championship. Besides Nishikori, Alex Calatrava was a finalist in 2000 and Andrew Ilie won the title in 1998.
"I just know that Nishikori was coming out of the quallies last year and I'll be happy to do the same thing," Korolev said.
Korolev, a first cousin of former player Anna Kournikova, is the first Russian to reach the Delray Beach final in the tournament's 17-year history.
Korolev dominated the 60th-ranked Rochus in the first set with his heavy groundstrokes, particularly off the forehand.
In the second set, Korolev jumped out to a 5-2 lead and served for the match at 5-3. Rochus took advantage of a brief letdown by Korolev to hold serve at love in the eighth game and to break in the ninth game, but couldn't push his way into a third set.
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