CLASH OF LEGENDS
Ace Nadal sets up Federer showdown
>> MELBOURNE: Rafael Nadal fended off Grigor Dimitrov 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (7/5), 6-7 (4/7) 6-4 in a marathon four-hours-and-56-minute semi-final yesterday to set up a dream Australian Open decider against great rival Roger Federer.
Nadal was under siege from the dogged Bulgarian for much of the nerve-shredding clash at Rod Laver Arena, but the Spaniard crashed through Dimitrov’s defences in the final set to book his first Grand Slam final since his 2014 French Open title.
With tension reaching boilingpoint and the terraces roaring, Nadal captured the decisive break in the ninth game and closed out victory on his third match point when Dimitrov hammered a backhand long.
Nadal and Federer will meet in their ninth Grand Slam final and first at Melbourne Park since the Spaniard won the 2009 title.
Earlier, American Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Czech Lucie Safarova enhanced their reputation as the dominant duo in women’s doubles by winning the Australian Open title for the second time.
The second-seeded pair had to scramble from behind to eventually overwhelm Czech Andrea Hlavackova and China’s Peng Shuai 6-7 (3/7), 6-3, 6-3 in a tense final.
It extended the pair’s unbeaten record to 12 matches at Melbourne Park — they won the 2015 doubles title in their debut as a team, but didn’t play together last year because illness forced Safarova to miss the championships.
It was their fourth Grand Slam success after also winning the 2015 French Open and last year’s US Open. Not only did Mattek-Sands strengthen her grip on the No.1 ranking and Safarova rose to a career-high No.2, the pair shared US$500,000 in prize-money.
In the mixed doubles, secondseeded Ivan Dodig of Croatia and India’s Sania Mirza will play Colombian Juan Sebastian Cabal and American Abigail Spears in the final tomorrow.
The Dodig-Mirza combination beat Australians Sam Groth and Samantha Stosur 6-4, 2-6, 10-5 in their semi-final. Cabal and Spears beat Chris Guccione of Australia and Elina Svitolina of the Ukraine 7-6 (7/1), 6-2.