Tennis: Nadal disposes of Novak in an hour

1.40pm - By DAVE WORSLEY

A new star has emerged in the tennis world with Spanish 17-year-old Rafael Nadal winning into his first ATP singles final.

Nadal, who entered the Heineken Open in Auckland ranked 45th in the world, defeated former champ and current world number 19 Jiri Novak 6-1 6-3 in the semifinals today.

The match, in front of a capacity crowd in fine weather, took just an hour and four minutes.

The pair had never played before and after a few games it was evident that Novak would need to up his game from the lethargic effort of his quarterfinal.

However the Czech former champ was not in the match and made numerous unforced errors while Nadal was pumped up in front of the crowd using an improved serve as well as his ferocious ground strokes.

The Spaniard had made one semi in 2003 on clay at Umag but had not had a great record on hard court until this event.

Nadal will now face either defending champ Gustavo Kuerten or Dominik Hrbaty who play in the second semifinal today.