Tennis: With three victories over players ranked above him en route to yesterday's semi-final at the Shelbourne Irish Open it had proved to be a week to savour for Conor Niland at Fitzwilliam Lawn Tennis Club, but India's Rohan Bopanna brought a halt to the 25-year-old Limerick man's hopes of reaching today's final, beating him 6-4, 6-4.

Bopanna will play 20-year-old Martin Pedersen, the quarter-final conqueror of Louk Sorensen, in today's final (3.0), the Dane, who had to come through the qualifying stage of this tournament to reach the main draw, beating Australia's Colin Ebelthite 7-6, 7-6 in the first semi-final of the day.

Niland, a graduate of Berkeley University where he was on a tennis scholarship, was up against the man regarded as the great hope of Indian tennis when he arrived on the circuit in 2000 but Bopanna (27) has struggled to live up to those expectations, his current world ranking 289.

It had, though, been a successful week for him in Dublin, beating fifth seed Simon Stadler and defending champion Mischa Zverev en route to the semi-finals. At 6ft 4ins, his favourite surface grass (rather than the artificial variety at Fitzwilliam), Bopanna's serve was his greatest weapon in the earlier rounds, but proved to be less effective against the Irish number two, ranked at 385 in the world, in the opening stages last night. When it came good, though, it proved to be the most lethal of weapons.

While Niland dropped just two points in his first four service games Bopanna struggled to get his rhythm going and the Irish man took full advantage, the quality of his returns putting Bopanna on the backfoot in most of the early exchanges.

Crucially, though, Niland failed to take the chances he created for himself in that opening set, spurning four break points in a marathon third game, and another two in the fifth. Bopanna produced the big serves when he most needed them and three aces in that third game helped him through the crisis.

Again, at 2-2, Niland failed to convert his opportunities, this time a powerful cross-court forehand from Bopanna and another big serve saving him. At 4-3 to Bopanna the heavens opened and the players left the court for 25 minutes, returning for Niland to level, winning his serve to love.

Bopanna went 5-4 up and having failed to earn a single break point until then he was presented with two, Niland serving a double-fault, netting a mid-court forehand and sending a backhand wide of the line. Bopanna, then, had two set points - he only needed one.

The pair exchanged service breaks early in the second set, Niland showing marvellous character to fight back to level at 3-3 having gone 3-1 down, but at 5-4 up Bopanna was clinical, a string of big returns earning him two match points, and, again, he only needed one.