Milos Raonic falls in Aussie Open semi’s

Andy Murray’s brilliant returning was always going to be a handful for Milos Raonic but it was the quality of the Briton’s serve that proved decisive in the world number two’s advance to a fifth Australian Open final on Friday.

Murray had looked to be in danger of leaving the tournament as Raonic took the first set and then edged a tie-break to go 2-1 ahead, within touching distance of his first Grand Slam final.

Though he seem irritated by the pause in the match, Murray seemed to settle in afterwards, breaking Raonic’s serve for just the second time in the match, at love, to go up 4-3 in the fourth set.

And when he served a double fault to be broken in the first game of the fifth set, he smashed his racquet into the court in frustration.

Murray, a four-time losing finalist in Melbourne, will face top-ranked defending champion Novak Djokovic on Sunday (3:30 a.m. ET) in a rematch of last year’s championship contest.

“I have a very good shot on Sunday if I play my best tennis”, Murray told reporters. “You can’t take that away from me. He dropped only one set, and I knew he was going to be aggressive and try to mix up the pace and come to the net”. I was in a much better position than where I was last time. Mirza, who won the 2009 mixed doubles title with fellow Indian player Mahesh Bhupathi, played a later semifinal Friday in mixed doubles with Ivan Dodig of Croatia.

Raonic, meanwhile, said he’s in no rush to determine the extent of his muscle injury.

Also one of the tour’s finest passers, Murray will be keen to test Raonic’s commitment to coming into the net early in the match. “I don’t think that’s like myself to do, but sometimes it’s a little bit too much to keep in”.

His serve is such a key weapon though that his volleys often don’t need to be flawless, with the points on his own delivery set up nicely for him with a boomer down the middle or slider out wide.

Murray has now reached his fifth final in Melbourne and he has said he hopes for a better result against Djokovic.

The world number two admitted off-court issues have been affecting his emotions on court, with his quarter-final win against David Ferrer particularly bad-tempered.

The Canadian’s explosive serve was the highlight of the set, which ended when Raonic’s fourth ace was called out, only to be challenged and overturned for the set point.

HEAD-TO-HEAD: Williams, as is the case with almost all of the top 25 players, has a winning career record over Kerber, having won five of their six matches (newcomer Belinda Bencic is the exception, she and Williams are 1-1). It also helps that Djokovic hasn’t been at his best-aside from the first two sets against Federer in the semifinals-which leaves the door open for what would be a minor upset.

Jamie Murray is in the doubles final with Bruno Soares against Daniel Nestor and Radek Stepanek on Saturday, giving the Murray siblings the distinction of being the first brothers to appear in the singles and doubles finals at the same major in the Open era.

Andy Murray survived a five-set scare to make his fifth Australian Open finals.

The pair combined to beat Czechs Andrea Hlavackova and Lucie Hradecka 7-6(1) 6-3 to add the Melbourne Park crown to the Wimbledon and U.S Open titles they won previous year. But his unforced error count over four hours hit 78, countered by 72 winners and just one break of Murray’s serve.