Pete Sampras learned Saturday just how much Michael Chang's game has improved.
Chang upset the top-ranked Sampras 6-4, 6-4 to reach the final of the ATP Championship for the first time. Sampras has won the tournament twice and was the defending champion.In Sunday's final, Chang will play Boris Becker, the 1992 champion and fan favorite, who defeated Thomas Enqvist 6-4, 6-7 (5-7), 7-5 in the other semifinal.
"If Michael is able to beat Pete 4 and 4, he must be playing extremely well and I have to make sure I play on the same level I did today," Becker said.
Chang had won only two matches in four previous appearances at the annual season-ending tournament of the world's top eight players.
Sampras had won his previous six matches against Chang, was 4-0 indoors against him, led 8-6 in career matches and had not lost to Chang since 1992.
It all meant nothing Saturday against the fourth-ranked Chang, who won in 1 hour, 16 minutes, appropriately the match with a service winner.
"I knew his serve improved quite a bit over the past couple of years," Sampras said. "(At key points), he was coming in with the big ace. That is something he didn't have four years ago.
"He is coming in, attacking the short ball. I think he realized that if he was going to get to the top four or five in the world, he was going to have to do that. And he has done that."
Sampras was too erratic against the steady Chang, who chased down seemingly irretrievable balls and served with new-found authority. Each had seven aces.
"A lot of things worked well for me," said Chang, who broke Sampras once in each set. "It was just one of those great days for me.
"It's always nice to win matches when you go out and you win them, rather than the other person losing them for you."
Sampras said Chang's return of serve also was critical.
"He was returning my serve very well, he was taking my best shot away and that was my serve," Sampras said.
"He was serving well on big points. I never found my range and he won the important points. That was the difference."
Sampras won the tournament in 1991 and 1994, and this year took the Wimbledon and U.S. Open titles for the third time each. Despite the loss, he will finish the season as No. 1 for the third consecutive year.
"I don't come to tournaments to get to the semis or to get to the finals," Sampras said. "I come to win and I wish I could have played a little better."
Chang has won four titles this year.
Becker will appear in his seventh final this year. He also won this event in 1988, when it was known as the Masters. Since 1985, he has played in all of the 11 year-end events except in 1993, when he failed to qualify. He lost to Sampras in last year's final.
Enqvist, playing in his first ATP Championship, was the only player to finish the round-robin portion of the event undefeated.
But he met his match in Becker, who was cheered loudly by the capacity crowd of 9,000 in the Festhalle.
Becker, No. 5 in the world, fired 25 aces in a tough battle that lasted 2:18.
He had to save two break points in the seventh game of the third set, and he seized his chance when he got it at 6-5, with the Swede serving.
Enqvist, who rose from No. 53 to No. 8 in the rankings this year after winning five titles, began with a double-fault. He then hit a backhand long, and was unlucky on the next point, when Becker's return clipped the net and trickled into Enqvist's half of the court.
Facing three match points, Enqvist attempted a backhand passing shot, but it sailed into the net.
"When he needed to serve well, he put his first serve in and I didn't," Enqvist said. "That was the key."
At New York, Steffi Graf was unhappy, Anke Huber was delighted. Together, they'll give the German taxman another $750,000 to worry about.
That's how much the top two finishers will pocket after Sunday's WTA Tour Championships finale, with the winner collecting $500,000.
Graf, the top seed and heavy favorite, grabbed a spot in the title match of this season-ending tournament by beating Natasha Zvereva 6-4, 6-3 in Saturday's semifinals. Huber then joined her German compatriot by blunting the power of Brenda Schultz-McCarthy 6-3, 6-3.
About the only thing that has bothered Graf this year has been the taxman. She has been questioned at least twice, and her father, Peter, currently is in jail for alleged tax evasion.
Despite her off-court problems, including a bad back and sore foot, Graf has been nearly unstoppable. Saturday's victory ran her 1995 match record to 46-2.
Zvereva, making a rare semifinal singles appearance in a major tournament, became the first player this week to break Graf's serve. It stirred her up.
"I just lost a little concentration," Graf said. "I wasn't a hundred percent happy with how I was playing, so I started to rush a little in the beginning of the second set."
That was when Zvereva, after losing the opening set, raced to a 3-0 lead.
"I got upset at myself," Graf said. "I felt I wasn't playing very well on her serves. But I didn't get nervous at all; I was getting upset with myself. I want to play more aggressive, that's all."
Graf began the fourth game with an ace, her third of the match. After a double-fault, she served two more aces, then held serve by rocketing a forehand passing shot down the line.
She pulled even by breaking Zvereva's serve at 30, held at love, then broke Zvereva again, this time at 15. She was on a roll, one that didn't end until the match did.
Graf won six straight games to move within one victory of her fourth Championships title. In those six games, Zvereva won only six points.
"I started concentrating better, was more patient and waited for the right shots," Graf said.