Rogers Cup Semifinals

Well, you can't really ask for a better semifinal line-up than this one. While last year's quarterfinals were star-studded, with the world's top eight players making it to that stage, last year there were three out of four upsets - only Andy Murray made it to the semifinals out of the top four, and he went on to win the tournament. This year, the semifinal round is stacked with the big four, the four players who have dominated tennis for the last two years, and it should be fun.

Murray and Djokovic both had relatively easy times with their quarterfinal matches - the Scot's performance was probably the more impressive, because he was facing a tougher opponent in David Nalbandian, but he was effective from the very first ball, and Nalbandian was never really in the match. Djokovic had a relatively low-tier foe in Frenchman Jeremy Chardy, but he was up to the challenge.

On the other hand, Nadal strugged early on against an inspired Phillipp Kohlschreiber, but was able to gut out a win in three. Federer started better against Tomas Berdych, then seemed to slow down and very nearly lost the match. Berdych was up 5-2 in the third set, but his one-break lead evaporated and Federer pulled out the win in the tiebreak. This would have been a devastating loss for Fed, so you know he'll be inspired by this win.

Nadal meets Murray for the third time this year, and they split their previous two meetings. Murray won in Australia but Nadal won at Wimbledon. This match will hinge entirely on how Murray plays - if he's aggressive enough, he can beat Nadal, but if he sits back and lets Nadal dictate, then he's going to be out. Nadal will beat him every time if he tries to counterpunch. It should be an interesting match, though - Nadal is on an unbelievable tear this season, with only a single loss since April, at Queen's Club. On the other hand, Murray hasn't won a tournament yet this year. Two players with very divergent years, thus far. There's a lot on the line for both of them.

The other match is no less interesting, as Federer and Djokovic have meet more than a dozen times. Federer has the lead in the head to head, but Djokovic won their most recent match, which took place at the end of 2009. Neither player is having a great season recently, so whoever comes out on top is going to take a lot of confidence from their win. I think Federer has better form coming in, and he has to be energized by that win over Berdych. But Djokovic is the number two player in the world, stunningly, and he's - by the numbers - been the better player over the past year.

I still think a Federer-Nadal final is fairly likely, but none of the possible permutations that we could see come Sunday would be a complete shock, with four players of this caliber remaining in the tournament. Like I said before, it would be tough to ask for a more exciting line-up at this point.