World no.1 Novak Djokovic rallied from a break down in the first set to beat no.3 seed Tomas Berdych 6-3, 7-6 (3) in one hour and 42 minutes at the Khalifa International Tennis and Squash Complex on Friday.
Novak reached his 16th consecutive final and improved his ATP H2H record against the Czech to 22-2.
Berdych broke in the opening game of the match, but Nole responded with his best tennis. The Serbian star converted his chances in the sixth and eighth games to clinch the set 6-3 in 38 minutes.
The second set resulted in a tiebreaker, Nole came out winning it 7-3.
Statistics: aces (4-4), double faults (1-4), total points won (75-62).
Novak will attempt to capture his 60th ATP World Tour title on Saturday (18:00 local time / 16:00 CET) when he plays Rafael Nadal (ESP, 2) in the Qatar ExxonMobil Open final.
Nole and Rafa have played 46 times to date. The series is tied at 23-23.
Looking ahead to the upcoming challenge, Djokovic said: “It always represents a great challenge to play Nadal because of the fact that we have played so many times for the trophies. It adds more importance to that final.”
Photo: AP
