By Kamakshi Tandon

It’s been a bad week for Rafael Nadal on the golf course but things have been going all his way on the tennis court. By his own assessment, he played his best match of the season so far to oust Andy Roddick 6-4, 6-3 and reach the final of the Pacific Life Open at Indian Wells.

Going for his first Indian Wells title on Sunday, he'll be facing Novak Djokovic, who won 6-2, 6-3 over a limping Murray in the day's second semifinal.

All week, Nadal has been lamenting his form in golf – 21-over-par and 15-over-par in his last two rounds – but has rediscovered his tennis and is in a final again for the first time since Wimbledon.

Having some kind of distraction in this quiet area of the California desert has helped him maintain his concentration. “Very nice place, but what can I do here?” he said. “The Play Station is not working here... It’s important to have different things to [do] when you are outside of the courts.

“For example, I prefer to sleep watching one film or something, because if you close the lights just without the sleep, I can stay one hour, one hour and a half thinking about the match.”

Still, reflecting on his contest against Roddick tonight should put Nadal in a good frame of mind. He broke early in each set, both times capitalizing on a cluster of errors from the American, and never faced beak point on his own serve.

The Spaniard mixed up his left-handed delivery by going down the middle as well as catching Roddick off-guard with some fast serves down the middle. He got in 84% of his first serves, finishing with a Roddick-like 82% winning percentage on his first serve and 71% on his second.

“I think it’s [my] best match of the season, no?” said Nadal. “I wasn’t expecting 6-4, 6-3, for sure.”

Roddick, who had not faced a break point all tournament, played two poor games to get broken but could have been in even more trouble if not for some big serves at crucial moments. When he did manage to get into the net as planned, he was frequently surprised by the passing shots Nadal produced and how well the Spaniard was hitting his forehand down the line.

“I felt like his ball was really jumping out there so I wasn’t getting good swings on it,” said Roddick. “Combine that with me on my own serves, and it makes for an uphill battle.”

It was the first time the two had played since 2004, and they’ll meet again in April when the US plays Spain in the Davis Cup quarterfinals. “It’s a fresh start. I’m not going to carry this over a month, three weeks from now,” said Roddick. “Hopefully, the court will be a little bit different.”

Roddick was far more positive than after his loss today than last year at Indian Wells, where he went out early to Igor Andreev. “Why would I feel confident right now?” he said then. “It's just weird because, I used to hit for a half hour and then go eat Cheetos the rest of the day, come out and drill forehands. Now I'm really trying to make it happen, being professional, really going for it, and I miss my Cheetos.”

A year later, Roddick feels like he’s at least going in the right direction. The resurgence, which coincided with the beginning of his coaching relationship with Jimmy Connors, began with winning the title at the Masters Series Cincinnati last August and continued with a final at the US Open and a semifinal at the Australian Open, where he lost to Roger Federer both times. He hasn’t won a tournament this year, but has lost to the eventual champion each time. “There’s progress being made,” he said. “It’s a matter of stepping it up to the next level. I’ve gotten back to where I feel I belong in the spectrum of the game.”

So must Nadal, who remains at No. 2 in the rankings but whose stature has slipped since his remarkable summer last season when he defeated Federer four times, went unbeaten on clay, and reached the final of Wimbledon. With Federer having lost in the first round here, he’s re-established his claim to being the best of the rest.

He’ll be the favorite against Djokovic tomorrow, having also won their first encounter at Roland Garros last year when the Serb retired with a back problem.

Djokovic won his semifinal easily against a clearly hampered Murray, Murray had gone down hard during his match against Tommy Haas on Friday night and hurt his ankle and hip. In hindsight, he felt he should not have taken the court on Saturday. “It was a bit of an unprofessional decision on my part to have gone on,” said Murray.

During the match, he told the trainer, “I’m not moving. I look like an idiot.” But advised that he wouldn't do any more damage by continuing, Murray played till the end.

Roddick, who saw Murray’s match against Haas over dinner on Friday night, said he had been “thoroughly confused” by the up-and-down encounter but that it was "good TV" – he turned away from a boxing match to see Murray pull out a three-set win.

Djokovic's win means that he'll be entering the top 10 before his friend and contemporary Murray – the two were born exactly a week apart and have known each other since before they were teenagers – and becomes the second of the under-21 'young guns' to reach the top 10.

The first was, of course, Nadal.