Andy Murray and Novak Djokovic to play each other in Australian Open final
Seeded no. 3 at the 2011 Australian Open, Serbian Novak Djokovic will be going head to head with Britain's Andy Murray in the championship final. Djokovic thrashed Roger Federer in the semifinals of his draw to advance at
the tournament. Nole initiated the match with a 7-6 win in the first and took the second set 7-5 followed by the deciding third set 6-4 to eliminate Federer from the tournament.
Djokovic stated, "This two weeks is the most important of the year. This is where I want to set myself up for the rest of the year. It's good for the sport to have more players able to win against Federer and Nadal. They're
great examples of champions, especially in these matches where they play their best tennis. It's one of the best matches I've played definitely. I've been playing my best tennis in this tournament."
The no. 5 seed Murray got through with Spain's David Ferrer in the semifinals of his draw. Ferrer took the first set 6-4 shortly before the tables were turned on him as Murray took the second set 7-6, the third set 6-1 and
the deciding fourth set 7-6 to send the Spaniard home.
"It was tough. It was up and down but I changed my tactics well. I just started playing closer to the baseline, taking his time away a little bit. "I started slicing more and changing the pattern of the points. We were playing a lot of cross-court backhand
rallies in the first set and he wasn't missing a ball. I just went for my shots a bit more, came to the net more and I finished a lot of points off at the net," said Murray.
Earlier, Djokovic battled it out against Tomas Berdych of the Czech Republic. Berdych was beaten 6-1 in the first set, 7-6 in the second set and 6-1 in the third set to be knocked out of the tournament. Meanwhile, Murray
faced Ukraine's Alexandr Dolgopolov in the quarterfinal match played between the two. The Briton got off to a good start, taking the first set 7-5 and the second set 6-3. Furthermore, Alexandr bounced back to take the third set 7-6. The deciding fourth set
nevertheless went in favor of Murray as he took it 6-3 to eliminate his Ukrainian opponent from the championship.
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