It’s nearly the semifinals everyone had hoped for.

The top three players were there.  Federer, who nearly got booted playing Feliciano Lopez, escaped then had a good win over Xavier Malisse and Robin Soderling, was meeting Rafael Nadal who hasn’t had too much difficulty on the clay since Monte Carlo when Andy Murray put a brief scare and won a set.   Novak Djokovic had a slow start in his first round, then fended off a tough David Ferrer was meeting the upstart, Thomaz Bellucci.

Bellucci has been around a while.  He’s still pretty young, but he’s hardly a new name.  He’s no Milos Raonic or Ryan Harrison.  He beat the other top 4 player, Andy Murray.  Of the top 4, Murray is clearly the weak link, and least likely to make it far in a clay tournament.  Of course, we all thought it was some kind of Murray collapse which he’s far more prone to do than the other top players, and while that may be true, Bellucci did have a good tournament, beating Tomas Berdych, last year’s French Open semifinalist, to reach the semis.

The first match pitted Rafa Nadal against Roger Federer.  The conventional wisdom heading into the match was that Roger Federer didn’t have that much of a chance.  Federer already lost to Nadal back in Miami and that was hard courts.   In an attempt to psych himself up, he said that Madrid was, in his opinion, faster than Miami.  On the face of it, that seems like a ludicrous statement.

Miami is played on hard courts and Madrid is played on clay!  But the last decade has seen hard courts being slowed down so baseline play can be more dominant, and it has seen lighter balls being used on clay courts to speed it up some.  Miami is also known to be humid with heavy conditions while Madrid is played in altitude where the balls tend to fly on the players.

Even so, Rafa did beat Federer at Miami, so why not Madrid?

Federer didn’t start off well.  He got down an early break.  Although he had early chances to break, he didn’t and was down 4-2.  At this point, Rafa was kinda playing iffy and Fed went on a small run, playing good clean aggressive ball.  He took 4 of the next 5 games to get a 6-5 lead.  He then broke Rafa to take the first set.

But as usual, Rafa lifted his play while Roger’s play declined with errors, and Roger fell a double break behind and relinquished the second set 6-1.  He did a better job in the third set, but also got a break behind.  He played a great point to set up break point to get back on serve, but Rafa won the game anyway and took the third set, 6-3.

In the second semis, it seemed Bellucci would work some more of his upset magic by taking the first set from Djokovic, but Djokovic recovered to take the second set 6-4, and ran away with the third, 6-1.

This leaves the final everyone has been hoping for.  Both men have streaks of sorts.

Rafa hasn’t lost on clay since the 2009 French (to Robin Soderling0) and Djokovic hasn’t lost since the start of the year.

I don’t think either player has been playing spectacular.  Rafa has had the easier route, only giving up the one set to Federer, but otherwise, not struggling.  Meanwhile, Djokovic has played two 3-setters, admittedly, Ferrer being a quality opponent.

I lean a little to Rafa to win this.  Even in the two matches that Djokovic won, Rafa started off blazing and took a set.  Rafa plays best on clay.  It was clay where he regained his confidence last year.   Even so, I only give a slight edge.  Nothing succeeds like success and Novak is on a huge roll, so he’s going to feel he can compete with Rafa.

Has Djokovic-Nadal becomes the new Federer-Nadal?  I think so.  Federer is still playing well, but he hasn’t figured out what he can use to topple the top 2.  He’s also hurt by playing such an aggressive game that’s prone to errors.  He’s also not the returner that Djokovic and Nadal are.  He often plays close matches because he can’t secure a break even against lesser players.  Witness the Lopez match that went to three tiebreaks.

Meanwhile, Djokovic has the tools to hurt Nadal including a big return and the ability to cover the court well.  Both men come in full of confidence.

Either way, this will be another hotly anticipated final, their first on clay since 2009 when they played each other three times culminating in a huge Madrid match that may have been the best match of 2009.