Nobody wanted it to end. Everybody wished it had been the final. And only minutes after the match had finished it was being hailed as one of the best of all time. A classic.

It had seemed pre-ordained, after a generally lacklustre tournament, that the Australian Open semi-final between Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi would be nothing less than memorable.

For sheer sustained excellence, Sampras's victory over Agassi in last year's Wimbledon final could barely be surpassed, but grass is to Sampras what water is to fish. Here, on Melbourne's hard courts, the surface did not overly favour either player, and rich was the drama with Agassi, clad all in black, eventually overcoming Sampras 4-6, 6-3, 6-7, 7-6, 6-1.

Nobody, save Sampras and his closest supporters, could say Agassi did not deserve this win, for his preparation and his tennis have been exemplary. By contrast, Sampras had always appeared slightly off-key, so very nearly losing to Zimbabwe's Wayne Black in the third round.

Having played Sampras on 28 previous occasions, and having lost 17 times, including four out of five last year, Agassi was acutely aware of his opponent's capacity to elevate his game in an instant, notably when cornered.

"You don't want to play a great match only to give it away," said Agassi. "We both kept raising the stakes, but even after I had won the second tie-break I felt as if he could rise up again."

Just as at Wimbledon, there was danger in the cool, early evening air from the first point. You could smell the cordite, Sampras winning his first two service games to love, and then bludgeoning Agassi's serve to snapping point in the fourth game of the opening set.

It was only afterwards that Sampras revealed he had tweaked his right hip when pressing for that break of serve, although it was an injury that nobody recognised, at least not until the final set perhaps, when Sampras's resolve almost completely disappeared.

"It's not an excuse," Sampras said, although he may well pull out of his country's Davis Cup tie in Zimbabwe next week. "I lost momentum in the fifth set, and it was a downhill spiral."

The 14,000 crowd willed Agassi to take the match into a fifth set. He had had two break points at 6-5 in the third set but failed to convert either, and then found himself crushed 7-0 in the tie-break.

At this point, and for all his unwavering commitment, it appeared the Sampras serve would once more put Agassi, despite the brilliance of his returns, to the sword. "It was cold and windy out there and when a guy serves 37 aces you don't get to move much, accept your neck," said Agassi.

The only relief from the intensity of combat came in the second set when a flock of silver gulls, heading for their roost, held up an Agassi service game with a series of deposits. Sampras scowled as Agassi, always meticulous, made sure the court was towelled clean. Perhaps they brought him luck.

Yet at two sets to one down, most believed Sampras had completed the penultimate step towards a record breaking 13th grand slam title. Agassi had not won a tie-break against Sampras since 1995, and when a quite brilliant running cross-court forehand tipped the fourth set tiebreak in Sampras's favour, Agassi's goose - or seagull - seemed cooked.

But his response was electrifying, and the crowd went wild. "Your ears are ringing like it's a concert, but in a strange way it's incredibly quiet in your mind," said Agassi.

And so it was that tennis's great entertainer became the first man since Rod Laver to reach four consecutive grand slam finals. It seems inconceivable he could lose the final now.

It was near enough a racing certainty that Martina Hingis and Lindsay Davenport, the two top seeds, would contest tomorrow's women's final.

For Hingis the journey to her fourth consecutive Australian Open final has indeed been a piece of cake. Her six victories have been completed in just over five hours, during which she has not lost a set. Yesterday her semi-final win against Conchita Martinez, whom she defeated in the 1998 final, saw the "Can't Miss Swiss" live up to this diminutive, the 6-3, 6-2 scoreline flattering the Spaniard.

Davenport's progress has been similarly trouble free, although her fellow American Jennifer Capriati extended the number two seed in the second set of their semi-final, when all of Capriati's old verve rose to the surface.

The odds in the final slightly favour Davenport who has won six of their last eight encounters.