Richard defeated the Kazakh tournament surprise Yuri Shukin 6-3 6-4 to reach his 3rd final of the year. He will play the Spaniard Nicolas Almagro.
One break was enough to secure the first set 6-3, in which Richard dominated all the stats apart from serve percentage. Shukin, however, did not waver and posed serious troubles 6th game of the second set. Richard saved 2 breakpoints. As it happens so often in tennis, break points wasted cause a break immediately thereafter. This was exactly what happened to the Kazakh. Richard broke and served out the match 6-4. Though he needed 4 match points, he never looked in real danger for a turnaround.
