Will Nadal face Federer in Open final for first time?

All the cues and hand gestures so far indicate that the long-awaited Rafael Nadal-Roger Federer U.S. Open championship final indeed will materialize. Both of the world's top two players have performed with panache and power in spite of the tournament's most difficult weather conditions in memory - battering heat followed by hair-raising winds.

The only thing that can stop them is Saturday's semifinal round. No small task, with Nadal facing the man who upset him in the 2006 Open quarterfinals, Russia's Mikhail Youzhny, and Federer matched against No. 3 Novak Djokovic, the 2008 Australian Open champ.

But the odds favor a Nadal-Federer showdown, which would be - remarkably, given that either Federer or Nadal has won 20 of the last 22 Grand Slam events - the first time they duel for the U.S. title. Even more surprising, it would represent the first time in history that the same two men have played each other, at some point in their careers, in every Grand Slam final.

Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi, for instance, never contested a French Open final, just as Ivan Lendl never met Mats Wilander for the Wimbledon title.

Nadal and Federer have clashed in title matches three times each at the French Open (Nadal, 3-0) and Wimbledon (Federer, 2-1) and once at the Australian (Nadal). And now the chances of Nadal advancing to his first U.S. Open championship match appear slightly better than those of five-time champ Federer.

Nadal is 7-4 against Youzhny. (If Youzhny, seeded 12th, were to upset Nadal, he would become the lowest seeded man to play for the title at Flushing Meadows since a 19-year-old Sampras won the tournament as a No. 17 seed, in 1990.)

Federer, meanwhile, is 10-5 against Djokovic, including a loss to the Serb in the 2008 Australian semifinals. But Federer has beaten Djokovic the past three years here - twice in the semis after the 2007 final.

If top seed Nadal wins the Open, he will become the first man to win three consecutive Grand Slam tournaments in a single year - to go with his French and Wimbledon titles - since Rod Laver won all four in 1969.

Beyond all the numbers is the empirical evidence repeatedly on display for Open spectators: Federer's obvious grace is not preventing his hard work from showing through, and Nadal has brought a new magic to his relentless pounding.

Neither man has lost a set - Youzhny and Djokovic each had to survive a five-setter along the way - but the plot could be spoiled by Youzhny or Djokovic.

"You never know what's going to happen," Djokovic said. "I don't want to think about those losses in the last three years [to Federer], which were really, really close. In the moment, I'm feeling quite comfortable, and hopefully, I can continue on."

What kind of person would want to blow up a Nadal-Federer final? "I'm ready to be a bad person," Youzhny said. "I love to be a bad person in this case."