Holder and top seed Roger Federer beat unseeded Italian Andreas Seppi 6-3 6-1 in the Hamburg Masters yesterday to set up a final with Spain's Rafael Nadal for the second year in a row.

Second seed Nadal won a magnificent three-hour semi-final battle with Novak Djokovic, beating the fast-rising Serb 7-5 2-6 6-2.

Djokovic has won the Australian Open and two Masters Series already this year and would have taken over Nadal's number two world ranking if he had beaten the French Open champion.

With the retractable roof at the Rothenbaum closed to keep out the rain, there was an extra buzz around the centre court and Nadal and Djokovic wowed the crowd with some awesome rallies.

In the first semi-final, world number one Federer was only once under pressure on his serve against Seppi and closed out the win in 79 minutes.

Italian Open SFs (women): Cornet bt Chakvetadze 3-6 6-4 6-3; Jankovic w.o. Sharapova.

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