With improved game plan I can beat Nadal this time – Murray

The fourth seed eased into the semi-finals yesterday with a 6-3 6-4 6-4 victory over Nadal’s countryman Feliciano Lopez, and waiting on Centre Court tomorrow will be a very familiar foe.

Murray and Nadal have met six times before at grand slams, with the world No 1 winning four of those matches, including their last two semi-finals.

The first of those came at the All England Club 12 months ago, when Murray pushed his rival hard but still could not win a set, while it was the same story at the French Open earlier this month.

Grass should certainly give the home hope a better chance than clay did, and he is optimistic he can learn from those experiences to emerge victorious.

Murray said: “I believe I can win against him. I had chances last year. I was up a break in the third set, had set point on my serve in the second set. I think there was only one break in the first set.

“We both played good tennis. But I just have to have a better game plan.

“Sometimes it comes down to strategy. Sometimes it comes down to having more experience. I just have to go out there and play well and serve well and believe, and I’ll have a chance.”

Murray had beaten Lopez in each of their four previous meetings but the Spaniard is a talented player on grass in particular and was hugely impressive in beating Andy Roddick in straight sets in the third round.

However, he had expended a lot of energy in his previous match against Lukasz Kubot, coming from two sets to love down to win in five, and was simply unable to play at the same pace as Murray until the third set.

Murray was on the offensive right from the first point and the only surprise was that it took him until the sixth game to break serve.

He then missed three set points on Lopez’s serve before taking it on his fifth chance when his opponent netted a forehand.

The 29-year-old Spaniard was making far too many mistakes and he was broken again for 3-2 in the second set, with Murray cruising through the remainder.

He had lost only eight points on his serve in the first two sets, but there were signs at the start of the third that things might be changing, with Lopez forcing deuce for the first time in game three.

Murray held on, though, and then broke for the third time courtesy of two brilliant forehand passes. He had to save his only break points serving at 4-3 behind before hitting three successive aces to wrap up the most routine of victories.

The 24-year-old Scot said: “It was good. I got off to a good start in all of the sets. That helps against someone like ‘Feli’ because he serves well.

“Normally against the big servers, they like to put pressure on you towards the end of the set. But because I got ahead early in all of them, I was able to dictate the points from the back of the court and played a good match.”

There was a small moment of alarm towards the end of the match when Murray grimaced while changing direction and appeared a little uncomfortable from then on.

He added: “It was a little bit sore at the top of my hip, my hip flexor. But I was still moving okay. I’ll have a better idea of how it is in the morning.”

Lopez did not want to blame his epic match against Kubot for yesterday’s defeat and hailed Murray’s performance as the best the man from Dunblane has put together against him.

Lopez said: “When you play a long match as I played on Monday, you feel tired, even though I had a day off (on Tuesday). But I don’t want to use this as an excuse, because he was a much better player (yesterday) and he was great on the court.

“He played unbelievable tennis. This is the main reason why I lost. He was very solid, no mistakes, serving great, unbelievable returns.

“At one point I didn’t know where to serve because he was reading my serve very, very well.”

Nadal set up a mouthwatering semi-final with Murray by strolling to a four-set win over American Mardy Fish on Court One.

If Nadal brings the same game he displayed in the first two sets yesterday, Murray will have one hell of a fight on his hands to make his first Wimbledon final, although the Scot will present a much harder challenge than Fish, who disappointed at times yesterday.

The first seed broke Fish three times in the opening set and showed no signs of a recurrence of his foot injury to put in some punishing forehands and move 2-0 up.

Fish upped his game to take the third but a clinical break at the start of the fourth was enough for Nadal to take the match 6-3 6-3 5-7 6-4 and reach a remarkable 16th major semi-final at the age of 25.

Nadal feared the ankle injury he suffered on Monday could have ended his title defence, but there was no hint of any physical impediment to his game yesterday.

Novak Djokovic survived some scary moments to book his place in the other semi-final against Roger Federer’s conqueror Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.

Djokovic beat Australian teenager Bernard Tomic 6-2 3-6 6-3 7-5 on Court One.

The Serbian second seed, with just one defeat to his name in 2011, was lethargic and error-prone against his Australian practice partner, was broken three times and needed a run of seven straight games spanning the third and fourth sets to put him in command.

He will need to play much better if he is to progress into a maiden SW19 final.