Rafael Nadal emulated Roger Federer by
winning a third successive round-robin match at the ATP World Tour Finals on
Friday, edging fellow Spaniard David Ferrer at the O2 Arena.
With Nadal already in the semi-finals from
the Ilie Nastase Group and Ferrer going home after two defeats, it could have
been a non-event but the packed arena was treated to the longest match of the
group stage with Nadal winning 6-7(7-2) 6-3 6-4 after two hours 37 minutes.
Nadal, twice a runner-up at the Tour
Finals, will face Serbia's world number one Novak Djokovic in Saturday's last
four.
It looked as though the Spaniard might be
in for an easy ride when he won 10 of the first 11 points, breaking Ferrer
twice, but his 33-year-old opponent is renowned as one of the sport's best
battlers and he hit back to win a tiebreak.
World No.5 Nadal, who had already beaten
fourth-ranked Stanislas Wawrinka and number two Andy Murray, buckled down
though and levelled the match before breaking the Ferrer serve in the final
game of the contest.
Later on Friday home favourite Murray and
Swiss Wawrinka play off for the runners-up spot which would set up a semi-final
against Swiss world No.3 Federer, the other player with a 100 per cent record.
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