Rafael Nadal has booked his place in the Italian Open semi-finals by beating Andy Murray in three sets this evening.

Murray quickly took control of the first set and broke his opponent twice on the way to a 6-1 win.

Nadal hit back in the next set and broke the Scot in the second game, before racing into a 3-0 lead.

The Spaniard went on to hit 15 winners and made just six unforced errors as he claimed a 6-3 win to level the tie.

Murray broke Nadal twice in the third set, but the world number one quickly hit back each time to level the scores at 4-4.

In the 11th game of the set, Nadal broke Murray for the third time to take the lead and made no mistake in his next service game to claim a 7-5 win that settled the match.

Nadal will face Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov in the last four.