Austrian Jurgen Melzer capped off a stellar week at the Regions Morgan Keegan Championships, relegating fourth-seeded Canadian Milos Raonic to runner-up status for a second straight year at this ATP World Tour 500 tournament with a 7-5, 7-6(4) victory Sunday.
Melzer became the first 30 year old to clinch the Memphis crown since Ivan Lendl in 1991, and improved to a 4-7 mark in ATP World Tour finals. He also won the indoor hard-court titles in Vienna in 2009-10 and the clay-court tournament in 2006 at Bucharest.
The former World No. 8, who had recorded wins over top seed John Isner and No. 3 seed and former finalist Radek Stepanek this week, broke in the 11th game before serving out the opening set. Raonic went up 4-1 in the second set, but Melzer drew level at 4-4 and proceeded to close out the one-hour, 37-minute win in the tie-break.
Raonic had won 19 straight sets coming into the final, losing serve just once in 41 games. He fired 22 aces in the final to take his week’s total to a tournament-high 88.
Similar to 2011, the 21-year-old Canadian had come to Memphis straight from his title win at the SAP Open in San Jose. Last year, he was edged out by Andy Roddick in a 7-5 third set. He was attempting to win his third title of the ATP World Tour season, having opened the season with the hardware at the Aircel Chennai Open (d. Tipsarevic).
