By Chris Oddo / Thursday, October 31, 2013

 

On the strength of Tomas Berdych's victory over Milos Raonic, Stan Wawrinka and Richard Gasquet have
booked the final two spots for next month's ATP World Tour finals.

Photo Source: Julian Finney/Getty

Milos Raonic fell in straight sets to Tomas Berdych on Thursday at the Paris Masters, paving the way for Stan Wawrinka and Richard Gasquet to book the final two slots for November's ATP World Tour Finals in London.

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Raonic needed to reach the final in Paris at the very least to qualify for London, but his dreams of reaching the prestigious year-end championships were cut short by Berdych, 7-6(13), 6-4.

Raonic didn't go down without a fight, but Berdych was able to prevail in a long first-set tiebreaker, converting on his sixth set point to take the set.

Raonic entered Thursday's tilt with a 2-0 head-to-head record against Berdych, but he couldn't rebound after the disappointment of dropping that first set. Berdych would break the hard-serving Canadian in the first game of the second set, and he did not face a break point against Raonic the rest of the way, closing out his 52nd match victory of the season in one hour and 56 minutes.

Wawrinka, who defeated Nicolas Almagro, 6-3, 6-2, earlier in the day, reaches the World Tour Finals for the first time in his career, while Gasquet, scheduled to face Kei Nishikori in the night session, qualifies for the second time in his career, and the first time since 2007.

In other action at Bercy on Thursday, Roger Federer defeated Philipp Kohlschreiber, 6-3, 6-4, while Juan Martin del Potro defeated Grigor Dimitrov, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4.

Novak Djokovic defeated American John Isner, 6-7(5), 6-1, 6-2.

The eight qualifiers for London are:

1. Rafael Nadal
2. Novak Djokovic
3. David Ferrer
4. Juan Martin del Potro
5. Tomas Berdych
6. Roger Federer
7. Stan Wawrinka
8. Richard Gasquet