ROME – Britain’s Andy Murray remained on course for a second successive Masters final with Serbia’s number one Novak Djokovic after both came through the quarter-finals in Rome on Friday.

Murray, who lost to Djokovic in the final at Madrid last week, had little trouble overcoming Belgian David Goffin 6-1, 7-5 while Djokovic battled past a determined Rafael Nadal to end the Spanish fifth seed’s hopes of an eighth title in the Italian capital.

Murray, reaching the last four for only the second time after 2011, will go into Sunday’s final if, as expected, he accounts for French lucky loser Lucas Pouille in Saturday’s semi-final. Djokovic will meet Kei Nishikori after the Japanese sixth seed swept Austrian Dominic Thiem, who had knocked out Roger Federer, 6-3, 7-5.

Murray lost to Nadal in the semi-finals of the Monte Carlo Masters last month and although defeated by Djokovic last week, he is feeling encouraged with his steady improvement on the surface.

“I’m being rewarded now for the work I’ve put in on the surface,” said Murray.

“I didn’t necessarily expect to do well on these surfaces over the past couple of years… but I deserve it, because I’ve worked hard for it.” Between them, Nadal and Djokovic have won the last 11 titles in the Italian capital, the Spaniard claiming his maiden win in 2005 only two years after Andre Agassi’s last win in the ‘Eternal City’.

But on Sunday it could be Djokovic, the defending champion and tennis’s man of the moment, who will be looking to continue his winning run at the Foro Italico after a gutsy 7-5, 7-6 (7/4) win over Nadal.

Finding an “extra gear” proved key as Djokovic took his winning streak over Nadal to seven matches. The last time the Spaniard beat Djokovic was in the final of Roland Garros in 2014.

Admitting he had a slow start to both sets, Djokovic said: “Towards the end of both sets I managed to find an extra gear, to play with a little bit more purpose, and come up with some aggressive play.

“I didn’t take the initiative first, I wanted to be more aggressive. But that’s easier said than done.” Djokovic rallied from a break down in both sets to thwart Nadal in a pulsating two hours and 25 minutes. He has now won 15 straight sets against Nadal since the Spaniard prevailed in Paris two years ago, but Djokovic said it was far from straightforward.

“Winning against Nadal is the ultimate challenge on clay courts and one of the toughest challenges we have in sport,” he added.

“I have to be very pleased with the way I handled myself in the big moments today. I won against one of my biggest rivals on his preferred surface.” Nadal, meanwhile, was keen to put some gloss on his setback just over a week ahead of his bid for a 10th title at Roland Garros, but he will be keen to remedy the mistakes that led him to lose key points at crucial moments.

Notably, with Nadal leading 5-4 in the second set, Djokovic saved no less than five set points before breaking back on his first break point to level the set 5-5 and then going on to win the tie break.

“Today I was there mentally, hitting good shots. I was very close this afternoon, and that’s positive,” he said.

“Obviously, when you feel you’re so close to taking both sets and you exit the tournament you can’t be 100 per cent happy.

“But overall I’ve competed at the highest level against the best player in the world. That gives me confidence that I’m ready for other things.” Murray will now be expected to book his first final in Rome but having watched the 22-year-old Frenchman “kill” David Ferrer in a third-round shock, Murray is taking nothing for granted.

“He beat Goffin last week in Madrid and (Richard) Gasquet in Monte Carlo,” said Murray. “This week, he’s been a bit fortunate, but he’s very good. I don’t expect it to be easy.”

MEXICO CITY – FIFA named a Senegalese UN diplomat as its first ever female secretary general on Friday, a historic move announced at a congress that sought to relegate world football’s corruption crisis to the past.

FIFA president Gianni Infantino made the surprise announcement in Mexico City that he had chosen 54-year-old Fatma Samoura, an outsider unknown to the football world, to be his deputy at the male-dominated organisation.

“The congress of today demonstrates without any shadow of a doubt that FIFA is back on track,” said Infantino, who was elected in February after his predecessor Sepp Blatter was brought down by the scandal.

“I can officially inform you here that the crisis is over and we are all looking forward to a great future,” he said after vowing that FIFA would be “reborn”.

Samoura, who has worked on humanitarian crises with the United Nations for 21 years, is currently based in Nigeria for the UN Development Program.

“We have to be serious when we say we embrace diversity and we believe in gender equality,” Infantino said, describing Samoura as the “most competent” person for the job, with experience in managing big organisations.

“She will bring a fresh wind to FIFA, somebody from outside, not somebody from inside, not somebody from the past but somebody new.” Samoura will take her post by mid-June after undergoing an eligibility check administered by an independent review committee.

“Today is a wonderful day for me, and I am honoured to take on the role of FIFA’s secretary general,” Samoura, who has also worked at the World Food Program, said in a statement.

“I also look forward to bringing my experience in governance and compliance to bear on the important reform work that is already underway at FIFA.” The former secretary general, Jerome Valcke of France, was sacked in January and banned from football for 12 years over misconduct in television deals and World Cup ticket sales – one of the many scandals that hit FIFA.

Germany’s Markus Kattner had been serving as interim secretary general since then.

Infantino also welcomed the appointment of Canadian football federation chief Victor Montagliani as the new president of the North and Central American and Caribbean football confederation (CONCACAF), whose previous three leaders left office under the cloud of corruption allegations.

FIFA officials meeting in the Mexican capital formally implemented governance reforms that were adopted at an extraordinary congress in February.

The measures include term limits, transparency in salaries, reinforcing integrity checks of council members, and renaming the disgraced executive committee as the council and pruning its powers.

The congress also approved a 2015-2018 budget that increases development aid to each football association by $400,000 (S$549,000) to $1.25 million per year.

FIFA, meanwhile, resumed this week the process to select the host of the 2026 World Cup, which had been frozen since last year over claims of misdeeds in awarding the tournaments to Russia for 2018 and Qatar for 2022.

“After all the issues, or criticisms, or whatever, which happened around the last World Cup bidding process, it is absolutely crucial for FIFA’s credibility that we have a bullet-poof bidding process in place for 2026,” Infantino said.

He noted that human rights requirements will be examined during the process for the first time and that bidders that fail technical requirements will be excluded.

But the scandals keep haunting world football.

On Monday, Infantino’s former boss, Michel Platini, said he will step down as head of European football body UEFA after failing to overturn his ban from all football-related activity over allegations that he received a dubious two million Swiss franc ($2 million, 1.8 million euros) payment from FIFA.

In other decisions, the congress reinstated Indonesia in international competitions but maintained the suspensions of Kuwait and Benin over government interference in the sport.

FIFA also admitted Gibraltar and the former Serbian province of Kosovo, taking the world body to 211 members and entitling them to participate in 2018 World Cup qualifiers.

Serbia vowed to legally challenge the inclusion of Kosovo, a former province that declared independence in 2008, a decade after a bloody conflict.

FIFA’s executive originally rejected Gibraltar’s bid, but the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ordered that the congress take a vote on the British territory, which is also claimed by Spain.