World number one Roger Federer defeated Benjamin Becker of Germany 6-3, 6-4 to reach the final of the Japan Open tennis tournament on Saturday.

The 25-year-old Swiss, who set an Open era record of a 56-match hard court winning streak earlier this year, pulled off a service break once in each set to score a convincing win in just one hour.

Britain's star Tim Henman secured a final berth for the first time in two years and seven months when he came back from 2-4 down to beat Lee Hyung-Taik of South Korea 6-4, 7-6 (7/5).

Federer, who had a tough three-set match against local hope Takao Suzuki in the quarter-finals Friday, got off to a flying start by converting the first chance to break in the second game.

Becker got a break point at 30-40 in the fifth game by charging to the net and forcing Federer to misfire a backhand, but failed to capitalize.

After breaking Becker in the third game of the second set, Federer went on to finish off the struggling German.

Federer hit a total of nine aces against Becker's four. He improved his winning record on hard courts this season to 48-2.

Federer has made 13 finals out of 14 tournaments this season, winning eight of them including victories at the Australian Open, Wimbledon and the US Open.

In the women's singles semi-finals, Aiko Nakamura kept local hopes alive by beating Chan Yung-jan of Chinese Taipei 7-6 (7/3), 2-6, 6-4 to make her first career appearance in a final on the tour.

French top seed Marion Bartoli took the place against Nakamura when she overwhelmed her compatriot and qualifier Camille Pin 6-0, 6-1.
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(Xinhua News Agency October 8, 2006)