Rafael Nadal wore down Tomas Berdych 7-6 (8-6), 6-2 on Friday to reach his second final at the Miami Masters. ( dpa )
The Spanish second seed who lost the 2005 title match against Roger Federer over five sets, will play in a best-of-three final at Crandon Park when he faces either Andy Roddick or Russian Nikolay Davydenko.
Roddick will be hoping to maintain his momentum after upsetting Federer a day earlier after 11 straight losses to the Swiss.
Nadal needed more than an hour to win the marathon first set against 10th seed Berdych, missing on his first six set points.
The three-time French Open winner went wrong on three in the 10th game as he served leading 5-4. Berdych also salvaged three more in the tiebreaker before Nadal went through on a Berdych double-fault.
In the second, the Spaniard quickly began to dominate as he broke twice to wrap up the win with 15 winners and three breaks of serve.
Berdych struck more than 30 unforced errors as Nadal moved ahead 4- 3 in their series by claiming his first win over the Czech on hardcourt.
"It was a tough match in the beginning of the first set," Nadal said. "He was hitting a lot of powerful winners."
"Finally winning the tiebreak was the key to the match."
Nadal said he was untroubled by hot steamy conditions.
"I'm from an island (Mallorca) so this is normal for me," he said.