It will be an all Swiss semi-final between the five time former champion Roger Federer and the reigning French Open champion Stanislas Wawrinka as both players clinched the two remaining spots in the last four with crushing wins over their hapless opponents Richard Gasquet of France and Kevin Anderson of South Africa respectively on Day 10 at the Flushing Meadows in New York.

The match between the 5th seeded Wawrinka and the 15th seeded Anderson was moved to the Louis Armstrong stadium as rain disrupted play during the ladies quarter-final earlier in the day and there was a threat of a thunderstorm later on in the evening. Federer and Gasquet battled on the Arthur Ashe stadium as scheduled. Both wasted little time to set up a repeat of the French Open quarter-final between the duo which Wawrinka won in June, 2015.

Federer took only one hour and twenty seven minutes to register a 6-3,6-3,6-1 thrashing of the Frenchman who had also reached the semi-final at Wimbledon this year. Federer is now 29-1 in night matches at the Open, his only loss coming at the hands of Tomas Berdych in the last eight stage of the 2012 U.S. Open. He looked in imperious form serving 16 aces and hitting 50 winners. He has now won 25 sets consecutively over 10 matches since he turned 34 on August 8, 2015.

Wawrinka produced his best form of the tournament as Anderson looked drained after his marathon four hour and eighteen minute upset of the 2012 champion Andy Murray on Labor Day. The scoreline was 6-4,6-4,6-0. Wawrinka has dropped only one set in the tournament to the American Donald Young but has played and won five tie-breaks so far in five matches. Federer leads Wawrinka 16-3 in career meetings.

The Semi-final matches to be played on Friday in the men’s section with my pick mentioned first:-

Novak Djokovic (1) (61-5) v. Marin Cilic (9) (23-13) ; Djokovic leads 13-0
Roger Federer (2) (50-7) v. Stanislas Wawrinka (5) (41-12) : Federer leads 16-3.

Among the ladies Simona Halep of Romania and the Italian Flavia Pennetta won hard fought quarter-finals on Arthur Ashe stadium to set up a.meeting between them on Thursday. Second seeded Halep defeated the former World number One Victoria Azarenka 6-3,4-6,6-4 in a match interrupted by rain.

Earlier on in the day the Italian Flavia Penneta beat the 2011 and 2014 Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova battling back from a set down to win 4-6,6-4,6-2 to enter the last four in New York for the second time in her career. Kvitova had nine double faults and was broken six times in the match.

The semi-final matches to be played in the women’s section with my pick mentioned first :

Serena Williams (1) (53-2) v. Roberta Vinci (-) (26-20) ; Williams leads 4-0
Simona Halep (2) (45-11) v. Flavia Pennetta (26) (22-15) ; Pennetta leads 3-1.

– Rasesh Mehta [Rasesh Mehta is an analyst with the Tennis Galaxy.You can reach him at the email: sportzcosmos@gmail.com]