Japan's Kei Nishikori took advantage of a fade in form from Stan Wawrinka on Saturday as Asia's top player reached the final of the ATP Toronto Masters with a 7-6 (8-6) 6-1 win.
Swiss second seed Wawrinka's game went away during the semi-final tiebreaker, allowing Nishikori to move into his second Masters 1000 final of 2016. The third seed lost to Novak Djokovic at the final in Miami.
Nishikori, who is still coming back from a Wimbledon rib injury, will face Serbian top seed Djokovic or Frenchman Gael Monfils in the final, live on Sky Sports 3 from 9pm on Sunday night.
"It's just great to be into another Masters final, I'm looking forward to my opportunity," Nishikori said.
Nishikori was caught on the back foot in the early stages as Wawrinka secured an early break of serve, only to lose it in the ninth game of the opening set.
With the battle heading into a tie-breaker, the double Grand Slam champion Swiss took a 3-1 lead. But that slowly slipped away as his 37 unforced errors mounted.
The persistent Nishikori held his serve as his opponent missed on a pair of set points in the decider, with the Japanese star earning the set on his first opportunity.
Wawrinka's game dwindled rapidly and Nishikori closed it out on the first of three match points.
"I just tried to concentrate in the tiebreaker," Nishikori added. "I played a point at a time.
Stan Wawrinka faded in the Toronto heat after the first-set tie-breaker
"I took confidence into the second set, tried to be aggressive on returns and stood farther back than usual."
Warwinka admitted he should have played better. He said: "But to make semi-finals in a Masters 1000 here on hard court where I never really played well on fast hard court - it's a good tournament.
"There are many things that I can be happy with. It was tough to play Kei today, there were tough condition, quite windy, fast. I had a lot of opportunity to take the first set. I didn't."
