And then there was four.

At the beginning of the tournament, there was some hope that the top four seeds might make it to the semifinals.  Such occurrences are rare enough.   There were question marks hanging over the heads of 3 of the top 4 players who lost early in Montreal.  With the loss of Nadal to Mardy Fish and Tomas Berdych upsetting the Swiss maestro, Roger Federer, two of the greatest players to play the game still had questions left to be answered.

This left Andy Murray, who had the most lopsided loss in Montreal, playing Mardy Fish, and Novak Djokovic playing Tomas Berdych.

Murray got into the first set by breaking Fish early on, and had chances to break him a second time.  Due to low first serve percentages by both players, both found it tough to hold serve, though Murray ultimately did it better.  He held to win the first set 6-3.  Up until the semis, Fish had not lost serve.

The second set was a lot patchier as both players broke each other 6 times!  Andy Murray, in a post-match interview, would claim that he felt something funny, something like cramping, which would come and go, depending on what he was doing.  He said he had a mental lapse.  He felt that he didn’t want to go big on his serve so he could “save it”.  But he realized he was breaking Fish rather easily, but likewise, Fish was breaking him too.

Fish got up 5-4 on Murray, but on serve, and the two stayed on serve until the tiebreak.  Twice in the tiebreak, Fish got ahead a mini-break, and twice Murray got the mini-break back.  Around 8 points to 7, Murray was at match point on Fish’s serve.  Murray went for a big return that appeared to clip the right sideline.  Murray came to net with a big smile, but as he was doing this, Fish challenged the call.  After all, this was a competitive tiebreak, and the ball appeared to just clip the line.

Replays showed that the ball missed the line by a sliver, so Fish managed to hold onto his serve.  Both men held their service points again, especially Murray serving big.  Murray again reached match point, again on Fish’s serve.  The rally went a few strokes until Fish sent an errant forehand wide, and lost the tiebreak, 10 points to 8.

In the ESPN post-match interview, Murray remarked that Fish had played so much tennis that although he might have wanted to win, he might have been fatigued, and this worked to Murray’s advantage since he hardly played any matches while Fish had won Atlanta, reached the finals of L.A., reached the finals of Montreal, and was already in the quarterfinals of Cincy.  Furthermore, there appeared to be some kind of injury.

Murray, as well, said he had some kind of injury or cramp that he hadn’t felt in sometime, though he didn’t seem too concerned it would affect the final.  Murray said playing the finals would help him assess where his game was relative to Djokovic’s.  While he wouldn’t mind beating Djokovic, a feat he nearly accomplished in Rome, seeing where his game is is more important to Murray, at this point, as he wants to go into the US Open playing peak tennis unlike previous years, where he exited the US Open earlier than he had wanted.

Final score: Murray wins 6-3, 7-6(8)

The other semi pitted Novak Djokovic against Tomas Berdych.  Djokovic was still playing good enough tennis to keep on winning.  Some of those wins have come a bit through luck.  Berdych is a player that, when he’s on, can be among the toughest to handle.  However, he’s more off than on.

Today’s match started more like the Monfils match yesterday and ended like the Tsonga match from last week.  Berdych got an early break at 3-all when he got Djokovic into a 0-40 hole.  Djokovic won the next point, but Berdych won the next point in perhaps the best point of the match when he was lured to net, managed to recover a shot down-the-line and stretched the rally 2-3 shots before pummeling a forehand for the break to lead 4-3 the consolidate the break on his serve at 5-4.

He showed, through powerful groundstrokes and movement, why he has been such a threat to top players.  With a big serve, flat powerful groundstrokes, he robs time of his opponents.  For the most part, Djokovic was actually hitting decently, but he was scrambling to stay in points like this.

Djokovic was eventually able to get the break back to 5-all, then break a second time to take the set, 7-5.  At that point, Berdych had come to net, and all of a sudden, the match was over.  Djokovic remarked that Berdych had a similar shoulder injury that Djokovic did, but apparently, it was worse for Berdych than Djokovic.

This means Djokovic will play Murray in the finals.

So how will that turn out?  I’m not sure Murray is playing his best tennis.   What he is doing well is pressuring opponents on their serve.  He did this with both Simon and Fish.  The Fish result is a bit more impressive given how good a server Fish is, but Fish’s serve percentage was pretty low, around 50%, which hurt his effectiveness.  Admittedly, Fish doesn’t always serve a high percentage.  He beat Nadal serving about the same.

Murray’s weakness is his own serve.  His percentages were dipping under 50%, but Murray does as well as anyone who serves that poorly on first serve.  Djokovic, meanwhile, serves around 70%, which is similar to what Nadal serves at.

Djokovic has had his second break in two consecutive tournaments with players retiring in the semis.  I felt Djokovic was hitting reasonably well.  The Monfils match seemed to reinvigorate Djokovic into hitting better.  Up to then, he had been rather pedestrian, getting back balls, and winning more due to his own steadiness than his ability to hit great shots from bad spots.

Djokovic should have the edge, given his win streak.  I think Andy will have a game plan in mind and will hope that he’s playing well enough to pressure Djokovic.  Murray is well-known for having a Nadal plan to play Nadal, which typically consists of playing aggressive.  I’m sure he has something of Djokovic plan as well.  He may unveil this play tomorrow.

Finals will be played 12:30 locally.