Nadal into final after five-hour marathon

RAFAEL NADAL will face Roger Federer in the Australian Open men’s final — but it needed a mammoth effort from the world number one to get there.

The top seed took a record five hours and 14 minutes — the longest men’s match in history at the Australian Open — to get past fellow Spaniard and left-hander Fernando Verdasco 6-7 (4-7) 6-4 7-6 (7-2) 6-7 (1-7) 6-4 in an enthralling battle on Rod Laver Arena.

Federer should be thanking Verdasco for making Nadal work so hard for his win in a match that had everything — blistering ground strokes, delicate drop shots, smashes, some truly bullet-like serving, and even the odd volley.

The 14th seed had lost all six previous meetings against his Davis Cup team-mate, taking only one set off the 22-year-old Majorcan in that time.

But Verdasco has found a new level to his game, and his serve is one of his key weapons and he used it to good effect, just as he had against Andy Murray and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.

Nadal , who had not dropped a set on his way to the last four, produced some magic, too, curling in a couple of beauties that looked for all the world as though they were going out.

Verdasco, showed he could spin too, hitting 93 winners. But it came down to the 10th game of the fifth set, where two double faults — the last on match point — handed Nadal the win.