Nadal plays tsitsipas in final

Rafael Nadal beat Karen Khachanov 7-6 (7/3) 6-4 on Saturday to set up a final with birthday boy Stefano Tsitsipas at the Toronto Masters.

The Spanish icon will try on Sunday to spoil the 20th celebrations of the Greek youngster, who reached the second final of his career by beating Wimbledon finalist Kevin Anderson 6-7 (4/7), 6-4, 7-6 (9/7), saving a match point in victory.

World number one Nadal won a battle of the tennis generations with Tsitsipas last April in the Barcelona title match.

"To win this match is important, it's very important to be in the final of Toronto," Nadal said after running his season record to 39-3 in a match which ended after midnight local time.

"I'm motivated every day when I wake up, there is always something to improve," said the 32-year-old.

"I want to stay around for as long as possible (in tennis)."

Top seed Nadal edged out the first set in a tiebreaker after a two-hour, rain-delayed start.

In the second, Nadal went about finishing up his business with a break in the third game and on his way to the win in just over an hour and a quarter.

Nadal leads the all-time list of Masters 1000 titles on 32. He will be playing his 116th ATP final and stands two wins away from 80 trophies.

Tsitsipas, who will move to at least 15th in the rankings, became the first man since Jo-Wilfried Tsonga here in 2014 to defeat four Top 10 players at the same event.

He dispatched Dominic Thiem, Novak Djokovic, and Alexander Zverev before downing Anderson. He will be the first unseeded finalist in Canada since Nicolas Kiefer in 2008.

"It feels like I'm playing Davis Cup and everyone is backing me up and they're so supportive," Tsitsipas said.

"Four wins against top 10 players. I would never imagine that I could pull this out in a single tournament. I  don't know if I got lucky with all those players, but somehow it happened that I played four top 10 and managed to beat them, which is a huge achievement for me and for my game this week."

Tsitsipas worked for two hours, 48 minutes to secure his upset of the hard-serving South African, with Anderson going down with 10 aces.

"It doesn't matter what the score. I'm always going to attack. I'm always going to go to the ball," Tsitsipas said.

Halep, Stephens in final

Montreal: Sloane Stephens sent defending champion Elina Svitolina crashing out of the WTA Canada tournament in Montreal on Saturday to set up a rematch of the French Open final against Simona Halep.

American third seed Stephens surged into Sunday's final against world number one Halep after overpowering Svitolina 6-3, 6-3 in the day's second semi-final.

Stephens had dominated the first set, scoring two early breaks to race into a 4-0 lead against a hesitant Svitolina.

Svitolina rallied briefly to get back to 5-3 but then handed Stephens another break and the first set when she sent a forehand wide.

The second set was a similar story, with Stephens going 3-1 up after an early break.

The 25-year-old from Florida then overcame a wobble in the fifth game, double-faulting three times before eventually holding for a 4-1 lead and closing out the set.

US Open winner Stephens will go against Halep on Sunday, having only beaten the Romanian twice in their previous eight meetings.

Halep, who defeated Stephens in three sets at Roland Garros in June, earlier cruised past Australia's Ashleigh Barty 6-4, 6-1 to book her place in the final.

Halep was in control from the outset against a nervous-looking Barty, whose challenge was undone by a string of unforced errors.