Stan Wawrinka subjected Andy Murray to a barrage of body blows as he broke down the Briton’s formidable defences to reach the French Open final yesterday, twice coming from a set down to win a high-octane contest 6-7(6) 6-3 5-7 7-6(3) 6-1.
The Swiss 2015 champion hit a staggering 87 winners as he avenged last year’s semi-final defeat by the world number one to set up a final against nine-times champion Rafa Nadal who beat rising Austrian talent Dominic Thiem 6-3 6-4 6-0.
Murray absorbed everything Wawrinka threw at him for most of the four hour and 34 minute contest but after winning a tense fourth set, Wawrinka steamed ahead in the decider as the Briton’s armour was finally pierced.
The third seed, at 32 the oldest man to reach the Roland Garros final since Niki Pilic finished runner-up in 1973, was long frustrated by Murray but never lost faith despite seeing his opponent rally back from a break down in the first and third sets.
“There are two ways of seeing things and I chose to be positive, knowing that I was dominating,” said Wawrinka, who has won the three grand slam finals he has played.
Murray, who arrived in Paris on the back of a woeful claycourt season, said he could take a lot of positives from his run to the semis.
“I’m proud of the tournament I had. I did well considering. I was one tiebreak away from getting to the final,” said the Scot, who was runner-up to Novak Djokovic last year.
“When I came here I was really struggling. I turned my form around really well and ended up having a good tournament.”
The 31-year-old Spaniard, ready to reclaim his Roland Garros crown after a two-year hiatus, dispatched the sixth seed in little more than two hours and is on the verge of becoming the first player to win the same grand slam tournament 10 times.
Thiem, like fourth seed Nadal, had reached the semi-final without dropping a set and had trounced Serbian defending champion Novak Djokovic in the quarter-finals.
But after starting brightly in the early evening sunshine his challenge disappeared into the encroaching shadows on Court Philippe Chatrier – an arena on which Nadal has never lost a semi-final or final since his debut
Nadal has dropped only 29 games to reach the finalurpassing his previous best of 35 in 2012 and only two more than Bjorn Borg’s record set in 1978.
Swedish great Borg might still hold that mark but Nadal has long since left the six-times French Open champion behind in the Roland Garros record books.
After Nadal’s limp exit to Djokovic in 2015 and the wrist injury that cut short his challenge last year, the Spanish claycourt king looks hungrier than ever to extend his domination on the clay surface where he has no rival.
A break for Thiem in the opening game quickly concentrated minds.
However, any prospect of a
tussle to match the drama of the day’s first instalment did not last long as Nadal recovered with two breaks of his own to take the opening set and gain a vital foothold in the game.
His opponent, Thiem, whose elegant single-handed backhand had little effect throughout the contest, had break points early in the second set but a vibrant Nadal slammed the door shut.
The Spaniard, whose only defeat on the red dirt this year came against Thiem in Rome, then broke with a clubbing forehand and lost only three more points on serve as he wrapped up the second set.
Thiem’s hopes of emulating compatriot Thomas Muster’s French title in 1995, were all but over in a flash as Nadal raced through the third set in 28 one-sided minutes.