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PARIS - Experience proved no match for youthful vitality as Rafael Nadal trampled over his boyhood mentor at the French Open tennis championships on Wednesday.
Nadal did not let sentimentality blur his focus and pulverised his friend and fellow Spaniard Carlos Moya 6-4 6-3 6-0 to set up
a semifinal showdown with Serb Novak Djokovic.
The brutal destruction took Nadal's Roland Garros record to 19-0 and more significantly, it kept him in line to match Bjorn Borg's hat-trick of titles achieved in 1980.
While Nadal has never experienced the losing feeling in the French capital, Djokovic, who at 20 is a year younger than the Spaniard, was delighted to be still standing.
He ended the giant-killing run of Russian Igor Andreev with a relentless 6-3 6-3 6-3 exhibition to became the first Serbian man to take his place amongst the last four in Paris.
After keeping the Serbian flag flying high over Roland Garros by joining female compatriots Jelena Jankovic and Ana Ivanovic in the semis, it did not take long for reality to set in.
Djokovic's reward for such a dynamic display is a date with the double French Open champion, a man no one has ever beaten at the claycourt grand slam.
The task will be all the more difficult as Djokovic had made it this far without facing a single player in the top 50 -- with his list of victims standing at 123, 312, 129, 51 and 125th in the world.
Before he starts planning Nadal's downfall, Djokovic was keen to take some time out to absorb his own accomplishment.
"My first semifinal of a grand slam, it's the biggest success I've had in my career," said the sixth seed, whose last two trips here ended in premature retirements.
"A lot of people expected for me to reach the second week here and I'm happy that I did it. I'm really looking forward to the semifinal."
Thirty-year-old Moya also had visions of progressing further in the tournament. But to do that he had to find away around a player more than nine years his junior.
Nadal was still crafting his claycourt skills as a precocious 12-year-old when Moya lifted the Musketeers' Cup in 1998.
Keen that others should benefit from his triumph, Moya went back home and passed on some tips to his young friend.
On Wednesday, it did not even cross Nadal's mind to repay the favour.
From the moment Nadal bounded on court, he was out to do damage.
Unleashing his forehands with ferocious power, Nadal got the first break at 3-2 in the first set when Moya's shot kissed the tape and cruelly rolled back on to his own side of the court.
It did not take Nadal much longer to pocket the first set and the second set flashed by even quicker.
Facing three set points on his serve, Moya looked up to the heavens for help. His prayers seemed to have been answered when he produced a stunning reflex volley from the baseline to lob Nadal and save the first.
While his spirit was willing, his body was slowy letting him down and that proved to be Moya's last hurrah as Nadal reeled off eight games in a row to end his friend's torment after two hours.
RESULTS:
French Open tennis men's singles quarterfinals: (prefix denotes seeding)
2-Rafael Nadal (Spain) bt 23-Carlos Moya (Spain) 6-4 6-3 6-0, 6-Novak Djokovic (Serbia) bt Igor Andreev (Russia) 6-3 6-3 6-3.
- REUTERS
