Tennis Roundup : Lendl Beats Becker, but Connors Is Forced to Default

Top-seeded Ivan Lendl of Czechoslovakia overpowered Wimbledon champion Boris Becker of West Germany, 6-3, 7-6, Saturday to advance to the championship match of the $375,000 Seiko tournament at Yoyogi National Stadium in Tokyo.

Defending champion Jimmy Connors defaulted with a back injury before his semifinal match against third-seeded Mats Wilander, leaving the Swede to play Lendl today for the $60,000 first prize.

Connors, who complained repeatedly throughout the week that he was tired of tennis, dropped out because he reinjured a lower back muscle during a quarterfinal victory over Vince Van Patten, trainer Todd Snyder said.

In the Lendl-Becker match, Lendl was penalized points in the eighth game of the second set for arguing with the umpire, throwing down his racket and cursing.

“Sometimes, I play really well when I get upset, and sometimes, I play really bad,” Lendl, 26, said after the victory. “Today I was lucky.”

Chris Evert Lloyd and Manuela Maleeva swept into the final of the $175,000 Pretty Polly women’s indoor tournament at Brighton, England.

Lloyd, seeded first, moved within one victory of regaining the world’s No. 1 spot from Martina Navratilova with a 6-3, 6-2 win over unseeded Annabel Croft of England. Maleeva, seeded fourth, staved off a late rally by England’s Jo Durie and won, 6-3, 7-6.

Paul Annacone and Marty Davis won their semifinal matches in the $200,000 Black and Decker indoor championships at Melbourne, Australia.

The top-seeded Annacone defeated his doubles partner, Christo Van Rensburg, 6-7, 6-4, 6-3, while Davis, seeded sixth, outlasted second-seeded Ben Testerman, 6-4, 6-7, 6-4.

Sweden’s Peter Lundgren upset Tim Wilkison, 6-4, 1-6, 7-6, to reach the final of the $119,200 Cologne GoldStar indoor tournament at Cologne, West Germany.

Lundgren’s opponent in today’s final will be Ramesh Khrishnan of India, who defeated Mark Dickson, 2-6, 6-1, 7-5, in the other semifinal.

Third-seeded Charlie Owens of Pinehurst, N.C., upset top-seeded Zan Guerry of Chattanooga, Tenn., 6-0, 6-3, in a 55-minute final to win the USTA National men’s 35-year-old division clay-court championship at Delray Beach, Fla.