He may be Spain’s No. 2 player, but David Ferrer played like the country’s No. 1 to defeat his compatriot…

The 31-year-old Spanish tenista upset world No. 1 Rafael Nadal on Saturday to reach the Paris Masters.

Defending champion Ferrer, who won his only Masters title here last year, dominated his fellow Spaniard 6-3, 7-5 to set up the championship decider on Sunday against Novak Djokovic, who came back to win 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 against the 2011 Paris champion Roger Federer.

Nadal was bidding to become the first player since Andre Agassi in 1999 to win both the French Open and Paris Masters in the same season but again came up short at a tournament where he last played in 2009.

Nadal hit an uncharacteristic 25 unforced errors and converted just one break point in seven attempts as Ferrer defeated his rival for only the fifth time in 21 meetings.

The world number four received plenty of support from the Paris crowd and carved out the decisive break to go 6-5 in the second set before serving out for the match.

“It was definitely the best match I’ve played all week and I was fighting for every ball but I’m really pleased because I played my best tennis,” said Ferrer.

”Now, I’m going to try and recover and play a strong match tomorrow (Sunday) but I love it here and I have great memories,” added the man who defeated Poland’s Jerzy Janowicz in last year’s final.