Ivanisevic topples Kuerten in Masters

Wimbledon champion Goran Ivanisevic dented Gustavo Kuerten's hopes of claiming the year-end top ranking when he outlasted the French Open champion to win their Masters Cup round-robin match 6-2, 6-7, 6-4 on Tuesday.

Ivanisevic completely dominated the early stages of the match, pounding Kuerten with heavy serves and unplayable forehands.

The eighth-seeded Croatian stumbled as he closed in on an unlikely victory but regained his composure, serving his 28th ace to set up match-point and then sending a backhand volley crosscourt to finish an intense match in one hour and 51 minutes.

It was one of those days when the "good Goran" turned up to play -- the Croatian's way of explaining the two sides of his volatile nature.

Ivanisevic is only 13th in the Champions' Race and made it into the elite eight-man tournament by virtue of his extraordinary Wimbledon victory which he achieved as a wild card entrant.

POWER GAME

But it was as if Ivanisevic was atop the Champions' Race and not Kuerten as he raced through the first set in only 25 minutes.

Ivanisevic's power game helped him to break Kuerten's serve in the second game of the first set and he claimed another break six games later when he rifled a backhand service return past a bewildered Kuerten.

Kuerten served solidly in the second set but was never able to settle into his baseline routine against Ivanisevic, whose serve regularly topped 190 kilometres (118.1 miles) per hour.

The Brazilian kept plugging away and at least managed to keep his own serve on track during the second set to force the tiebreak, which he won 7-2.

But Ivanisevic grabbed the crucial break of serve in the third game of the final set.

Despite being upset by a handful of line calls which threatened to bring out "bad Goran", Ivanisevic held his nerve to close out the match in front of a disappointingly small crowd of about 3,000 in the 17,800 capacity SuperDome.

Kuerten's loss opens the way for challengers Lleyton Hewitt and Andre Agassi.

The Brazilian leads the Champions' Race by 48 points from Hewitt, with Agassi another 39 points adrift in third.

Hewitt and Agassi meet in a crucial round robin match on Wednesday.