Tiny Belgian Olivier Rochus found there was a significant gulf in class as well as height between himself and Karol Kucera as the Slovakian secured his sixth career title at the Copenhagen Open.

At 5ft 5in, Rochus is the smallest player on the ATP tour, while 6ft 2in Kucera is among the tallest, as well as one of the toughest.

He has put his injury torment of the last couples of years aside to begin this season well and was just too strong for Rochus on Sunday, winning 7-6 (7-4) 6-4 in exactly 100 minutes.

It was an early birthday present for Kucera, who turns 29 on Tuesday, and it also made up for his loss to Thailand's Paradorn Srichaphan in the Chennai final in January.

Kucera was once a top-10 player, finishing 1998 ranked eighth in the world, but he has slipped down the rankings after some injury-plagued seasons.

It has been so long since he last won a title, at Basle in October 1999, that he miscalculated.

"It's been a long time since I won a tournament, almost three years," he said.

"I was very nervous today. I really wanted to win and that put a lot of pressure on me before the match.

"I think the first set was the key to win the match. I had a little bit of luck winning it.

"In the second set I didn't make too many mistakes and I also created some opportunities to break him.

"My goal is to enjoy tennis. The last two, three years have been really tough for me. I had a lot of injuries and it was tough to start over and be focused again. Now I've been healthy for almost nine months."

While Kucera was the tournament's third seed, Rochus was unseeded despite finishing runner-up last season, when Germany's Lars Burgsmuller was his conqueror.

"When you lose two finals in a row you're disappointed. A title is something special," he said.