Agassi Gives Ferreira a Rocket

Andre Agassi beat South Africa's Wayne Ferreira for the 11th straight time to reach his fourth Australian Open final today.

The 6-2 6-2 6-3 scoreline leaves Ferreira with just a single set in all those meetings between the veterans.

With both men playing in their 50th grand slam event there was always only going to be one winner and it took Agassi just 87 minutes to reach the final of a Championship he has already won three times.

Agassi was two sets up in less than an hour as the unseeded Ferreira was swamped on Rod Laver Arena from the very start. He simply went through the motions in the third set as Agassi wrapped things up. Agassi, looking to become the first overseas player to win four Australian Open titles, will face either fellow American Andy Roddick or Germany's Rainer Schuettler in Sunday's championship decider.

Asked how he made ti look so easy, Agassi replied: "I work hard to make it look that way, I promise you that.

"I was hitting the ball cleanly and taking control of the points. I can not have any complaints."

Agassi has the advantage of an extra day off over his fellow finalist as Roddick and Schuttler play tomorrow night.

Having had to play just 17 complete sets - out of a possible 30 - to get to the final the American hardly needs the rest but plans to make the most of it. "I am just going to take a couple of days off now, enjoy myself, enjoy being with my son and then come out here and let it all hang out," he said, somewhat alarmingly.

On every other occasion he has played Ferreira, Agassi has targeted the 31-year-old's backhand. It has been a ploy that has paid rich dividends and, under floodlights on centre court, Agassi went for it once again.

"Yeah, he has a certain game that brings out the worst in me," Ferreira said, who beat fourth seed Juan Carlos Ferrero in the quarter-finals. Indeed. The South African was kept guessing by Agassi's serve and given no pace on his groundstrokes. His own serve deteriorated, only getting his first delivery in a little over half of the time and he hit 28 unforced errors as the hole he was in deepened.