Andy Murray and Novak Djokovic will both have Grand Slam records in their sights when they meet in Sunday's Australian Open final - the latest instalment of their growing rivalry.

Andy Murray relaxed ahead of Australian Open final

Djokovic, the world number one and three-time champion at Melbourne Park, could become the first man to win three successive Australian titles since 1967, when Roy Emerson made it five in a row.

Murray beat Djokovic to win his first major title at last September's US Open , and is poised to become the first man to follow up his maiden Grand Slam victory with another straight away.

For the Briton, probably more tantalising is the prospect of firmly establishing himself among the current golden generation as a multi-Slam winner.

He faces a daunting task against the best player in the world for the last two years -and a player who defeated him in the 2011 Australian Open final.

"I think so much of it comes down to how you play on the day, to be honest," said 25-year-old Murray.

Head to Head

"For the last eight, nine months I feel I have performed to the highest levels that I could. Sometimes I haven't played my best in the big matches and I felt I had let myself down but you also feel like you have let the people who were watching down.

"I played a very good final at Wimbledon, then the Olympics, the US Open was very good and now here, so I need to make sure I maintain that form.

"But he's number one in the world, he was in the US Open final, French Open final, Wimbledon semis, and he's in the final here. So he's playing extremely well."

Djokovic has survived one almighty scare at Melbourne Park this year, beating Stanislas Wawrinka 12-10 in the fifth set in round four, but played superbly when thrashing fourth seed David Ferrer in the semi-finals.

Coach Ivan Lendl on Murray

"I think last year did him a lot of good, the Olympics win and the US Open win. You can see that he is more confident and feels better about himself and the matches. Now he has also gained a lot of experience, the match here last year, the Wimbledon final and the US Open were all tough, tough matches and Friday's match clearly showed that he has capitalised on that experience and it didn't catch him by surprise."

Born a week apart and having known each other since childhood, the Djokovic-Murray rivalry is now seemingly taking over at the pinnacle of the game.

"I don't know that when we were 11 we knew what a rivalry was at that time," said Djokovic. "We were just trying to play the tennis and enjoy this game.

"As we developed, of course we improved our games, we improved as athletes, as people, and it's nice to see somebody that you grew up with doing so well."

Rafael Nadal might well yet challenge again when he returns to action from a serious knee injury, with the latest comeback date now in February.

And although Federer's career is far from finished, with one Grand Slam title in the last three years, the 31-year-old Swiss has fallen behind when it comes to the biggest prizes.

Murray provided further evidence of this in Friday's semi-final as he dominated a match that only went to five sets because of Federer's enduring ability to play passages of unmatchable tennis.

Djokovic goes into the final with the advantage of an extra day's rest after playing for just 89 minutes, as opposed to Murray's four-hour win, and spent it "practising and recovering, nothing really unusual that I I haven't been doing for these two weeks here".

Murray admitted it was not ideal but did not appear overly concerned, saying: "You just try your best to be in the best possible condition for Sunday.

"Realistically, you're probably not going to feel perfect because of how the semi-final went, but it's not to say you can't recover well enough to play your best tennis."

And Murray enters his sixth Grand Slam final more relaxed than ever, after finally getting his hands on a major title in 2012.

"Those years of having all of those questions and then finally to be able to answer them, I think it was all part of the process," he said.

"So I hope on Sunday I can play a good match. Obviously having won against Novak before in a Slam final will help mentally."