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Federer advances to finals, again

Nothing`s new in the tennis world. Saturday saw Roger Federer doing all that is by now expected and anticipated of him. It took the Swiss tennis player only 58 minutes to defeat his rival, this time David Nalbandian, 6-4, 6-0. It was his 14th semifinal victory in 2006, three of them against Nalbandian, his 18th straight victory. Now Federer is close to winning his 10th title of the year. The Madrid Masters is turning out to be like any other tournament Federer makes an appearance at.

Federer will face 10th-seed Fernando Gonzalez, who beat Tomas Berdych 6-3, 6-1 in the other semifinals match. Federer is 7-0 against the Chilean. If he should win this, his 10th title, he would become the first player in the Open era to win 10 titles in three straight years. Also not new to the tennis world were Federer`s post-game comments. Humble and realistic as ever, he said "It has a lot to do with how he plays ? and he hit a lot of errors today, which I forced him to do by playing aggressively." Simply put indeed.

Berdych is responsible for local favorite Rafael Nadal not appearing in the finals game. Berdych upset the defending champion on Friday in front of a hostile crowd. Gonzales enjoyed their support in his match against Berdych and will play his first Masters final. "It`s tough to go in and get that welcome from 10,000 people. It was great that I had the luck of the fans being on my side," said Gonzalez.