Austrian Jurgen Melzer continued his amazing run with a broken right big toe by beating Radek Stepanek 6-4 3-6 6-3 in the semi-finals of the tennis tournament in Memphis on Saturday.
Melzer ousted top seed John Isner to reach the semi-finals.
With his win over Stepanek, Melzer reached his fourth final in the US 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 … I had to stay focused. I had to play my game.”
Melzer will meet Milos Raonic of Canada or Benjamin Becker of Germany in the final.
He 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 on February 16.
Melzer has been icing the toe after each match, and he said the injury bothers him now only 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.
On the women’s side, Marina Erakovic of New Zealand and Sofia Arvidsson of Sweden are set to play on Saturday in the final.
Melzer is in his 11th career ATP World Tour final and first since 2010 when he won his third career title at Vienna and also reached the final at Hamburg.
Melzer also lost a semi-final that year to Rafael Nadal at the French Open.
In Saturday’s match, he 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 decided to play in Memphis only 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, and yeah, we don’t play if something would be different. But the match went that way.”
Stepanek broke Melzer to go up 4-2 in the second set and fought off two break points to hold serve and even the match.
Melzer then had to rally from down love-40 to go up 5-2 before serving out for the win.