Nadal one win from 10th Barcelona title

BARCELONA: Rafael Nadal moved to within one win of a 10th Barcelona title on Saturday when he swept past Argentina´s Horacio Zeballos 6-3, 6-4 in the semi-finals of the clay court event.

World number five Nadal, who captured a 10th Monte Carlo Masters last weekend, will face Dominic Thiem in the final after the Austrian stunned world number one Andy Murray 6-2, 3-6, 6-4.

Nadal, 30, who will be playing in his 106th career final on Sunday, won the Barcelona title in 2005-09, 2011-13 and 2016.

Despite his straight sets win, on a centre court which is named after him, Nadal was far from pleased with his week´s work in the Catalan capital where rain has made the conditions heavy.

"In weeks like this, the one who manages to cope with the conditions we´ve had, which have been significantly different (than normal), is the one that survives," said the Spaniard.

"They aren´t the best conditions for me and against Zeballos it wasn´t easy at all. He took me out of my comfort zone, particularly in the first few shots of the rally which is what did damage."

Nadal will take a 2-1 career record over Thiem into Sunday´s final with all their meetings having come on clay.

"Thiem combined some brilliant shots with some errors against Andy. It will be difficult, he is one of the best players in the world on clay," he added.

Thiem fired 41 winners and six aces as the fourth seed advanced to his 12th ATP World Tour final with a first win over Murray.