(January 25, 2012) With Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal having booked their marquee semifinal match yesterday, Day 10 in Melbourne gave the remainder of the top four, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray, their chance to live up to their seeding. While Djokovic was up against the familiar face of David Ferrer, Murray squared off with a surprise quarterfinalist in Kei Nishikori.

As if the pressure of being the first ever male Japanese player to make the Australian Open quarterfinal was not enough, Nishikori headed into his match with Murray having already played 21 sets of tennis to Murray’s 13. Despite his coach, Dante Bottini, saying before the match that Nishikori had a great pre-season preparation and greatly improved his conditioning, the combination of the hours on court and an energized Murray were too much for the 24th seed.

Murray’s excellent return was on display in the 6-3, 6-3, 6-1 victory as he won 53 percent of points on Nishikori’s serve en route to seven breaks of serve. It was obvious that the miles were beginning to wear down the legs of Nishikori as if he was pressured into 39 errors to 30 winners while Murray played a cleaner match with 36 winners and 27 errors.

In the night match, Djokovic took on the World No. 5, Ferrer who had been quietly playing his way through the draw after a second-round scare from Ryan Sweeting. Forced to play outside of his comfort zone of hard, consistent ground strokes, Ferrer kept it close through the first two sets, but his 36 errors to only 18 winners were not able to get it done against the World No. 1 as Djokovic secured a 6-4, 7-6 (4), 6-1 victory.

The biggest change in Ferrer’s game over the last few years has been the improvement in his service games, but he struggled against the return of Djokovic, losing 43 percent of points on his serve and facing 12 break chances, saving seven. With the win, Djokovic will advance to play Murray in the semifinal, only the second time in what will be their 11th meeting that the two will face each other in a Grand Slam.

Djokovic holds the overall advantage with a 6-4 record over Murray, but more importantly, he holds last year’s straight set final win over the Scot. If Murray is able to navigate his way past the Serb, it will be his third straight Australian Open final.