Two-time champion Juan Martin del Potro went down swinging in a 7-5 6-4 quarter-final loss to Kei Nishikori at the Swiss Indoors on Friday.
Despite ending the match with 14 aces, the Argentine went down in just under two hours which wrapped up the ATP season for him. He will skip next week's Paris Masters to return home to train for the Davis Cup final against Croatia.
Nishikori, who lost out to Roger Federer in the 2011 title match, will be bidding to reach his second Basel final when he takes on Gilles Muller, a 6-7 (4-7) 6-4 7-6 (7-3) winner over Argentine Federico Delbonis.
Wild card Del Potro, whose ranking of 42 is 1,000 places better than in February when he returned after almost a year of wrist problems and surgery, was taking on third seed Nishikori in the first meeting since the London Olympics four years ago.
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Nishikori dealt out only seven aces, but fired his last one to earn a pair of match points - one was enough as he put away a volley winner at the net.
"This was my best match of the week," said Nishikori "It was a tough match. I had so many chances, so many break points that I could not convert.
"I played good tactics today, everything was working well."
Del Potro was pleased with his week which came after he lifted his first title in nearly three years at Stockholm last Sunday.
"I've been trying to fix my problems for the past two years," Del Porto said. "And I didn't expect to win a title at this moment in my career. It's still a motivation for looking forward to the future."
Top seed and US Open champion Stan Wawrinka slumped to a shock 6-2 5-7 6-1 defeat to German qualifier Mischa Zverev.
Zverev, 29, and ranked 72 in the world, will face ATP World Tour Finals hopeful Marin Cilic who beat Spain's Marcel Granollers 6-3 6-3.
Wawrinka was broken for 2-5 in the first set, got the tie back level by winning the second before going down a double break in the decider on his way to defeat in just under two hours.
Check our game-by-game updates from Andy Murray's semi-final match against David Ferrer at the Erste Bank Open in Vienna on skysports.com/tennis, our app for mobile devices and iPad and our Twitter account @skysportstennis this Saturday or catch the action from Vienna, live on Sky Sports 4 HD from 1pm & Basel on the Red Button.
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