Fifth seed Carlos Moya underlined his recent return to form by taming Thailand's hard-hitting Paradorn Srichaphan 6-4, 6-2 on Friday to reach the final of the Nasdaq-100 Open.
The Spaniard won the first semi-final of the $3.25 million hardcourt event in front of a near sell-out crowd and will now rise one place to number four in the world when the new rankings come out on Monday.
Moya, whose sole Grand Slam title triumph came at the 1998 French Open, has been enjoying a successful run since returning to the world's top 10 in 2002 after a three-year absence following a stress fracture in his lower back.
His win over 13th seed Paradorn was his 18th singles victory this year and gives him the chance to add the biggest prize in tennis outside the four grand slams to the trophy he won in Buenos Aires in February.
Moya now plays second seed Andre Agassi or number nine Albert Costa, who meet in the second semi-final on Saturday.
Everything went right for Moya, who briefly held the world number one ranking in 1999, against Paradorn and he ended the 74-minute match having held his serve throughout.
He broke serve in the opening game when Paradorn sent a backhand wide, and fended off three break points in the following game.
Paradorn's only other break point of the match came in the sixth game when he sent a backhand service return wide.
MATCH POINT
Moya was at the net for winners on several occasions, including an easy effort on his second match point.
"I played a very solid match and only made 12 unforced errors, and it was great for me to break his serve in the first game," Moya told reporters.
"That's the kind of match I like. He didn't play comfortably at all and my serve was hurting him a lot. The second set was very good, I'm very pleased with the way I've been playing.
"When you have such a bad injury it takes a while to put everything together again and be the same player I was before. But I'm still young (26).
"I think I have many things to improve and I'm really hungry to be up there again. I'll do my best, it will be a great story if I'm back at number one but it's going to be really difficult," said Moya.
Paradorn, voted the most improved player on the ATP Tour last year after a rise from 126 to 16 in the world rankings, thrilled spectators in his first appearance here with three-set wins over Todd Martin and Yevgeny Kafelnikov.
But he was disappointed at being unable to lift his game to those levels again on Friday.
"He played really well tonight and didn't give me the chance to get into the game, or get back into it after I had lost my serve," Paradorn said.
"I was playing okay but he always put me out of position, and then he'd just go for the next point. I tried to keep the ball in play but he was just ripping the winners."
Earlier, Agassi, seeking a record third successive title here, broke down the resistance of Younes El Aynaoui of Morocco in the third set of an absorbing 7-6 4-6, 6-1 victory, his 16th successive win in a tournament he has won five times since 1990.
Spaniard Costa also took fewer than 13 minutes to complete a 7-6, 4-6, 7-6 triumph over fourth-seeded Swiss Roger Federer, last year's runner-up, in a match held over from Thursday due to a thunderstorm.
