Written by Steve Law | 01 July 2011

At one set to love and 2-1 up in the second set there is a real sense that Murray can really do this. He's outclassed Nadal in the first, bossed the points and really shown he's got what it takes to keep Nadal on the run and guessing. 
Nadal is serving at 15-30.
And Murray has an 'easy' inside out forehand put-away to give him two more break points. 
He misses, by an inch or two.
30 all.
You can see the disappointment.
Nadal holds.
2-2. 
We sense a turning point.
Murray misses an awkward but routine overhead in the very next game. Maybe the sun was in his eyes.
Nadal is at 3-2 and the match is turning fast.
Murray starts to miss all those he was making in the first set.
The feeling of inevitability starts to grow.
Murray battles, plays smart but just cannot find his first set form.
He's missing more first serves and Nadal starts to dominate.
And so the story goes. 

Nadal Levels at 1 set all, takes an early break in the the third and Murray may still be thinking of that 15-30 opportunity. I have rarely, if ever, seen Murray play with this much class, authority, and control. But still it just isn't good enough. 

He certainly seems to have grown in stature since last year, he is a more accomplished and a better class of player. He is still only 24 and many say he will win a grand slam. And win Wimbledon. If we shoot Nadal, at least a few times as he'll likely get up from the first couple spitting bullets like a cartoon tommy-gun, I'd likely agree with the many.
And at least we've seen a more mature and confident Murray, at last. And certainly much more so than at the Australian Open where he looked completely out of sorts, and at the French where he abused himSELF horribly. 
Nadal took the match 5-7 6-2 6-2 6-4.

In the Other Semi Novak Djokovic was reminiscent of Agassi in his glory days.
'Moving like a gazelle' were the words I once heard Agassi use when he was practicing with Brad Gilbert. Today Djokovic made gazelle look sloth-like.
Only a massively courageous effort from Tsonga temporarily de-railed Djokovic's steam-train. Tsonga took the third set, after going two sets to love down, and had Novak screaming blue murder for a moment or two. But although Novak exhibited a few nerves in the fourth, he maintained his composure and took an early break, as Tsonga appeared to be running on empty. Tsonga may rue his bathroom break at the end of the third set, but it is highly unlikely that it made any difference and even more unlikely that he could repeat the feat of overcoming another top 3 player,(the other being Federer on Wednesday), from 2 sets down. Djokovic took the match 7-6(4) 6-2 6-7(9) 6-3

Well for me at least, It's nice to predict right occasionally: Nadal plays Djokovic on Sunday in the Men's Final. It could be a thriller.   

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