Venus Williams beat Roberta Vinci in a closely fought three-set match yesterday, settling a score on behalf of her sister Serena, to reach the Wuhan Open finals.
The seven-time Grand Slam-winner was a match point down to the Italian at one stage, but eventually saw her off in a final set tie break.
Williams looked comfortable going into the third set, securing a 4-1 lead over Vinci, but the shock US Open finalist pushed back, evening the score before finally falling to the American veteran 5-7, 6-2, 7-6 (7/4).
It was Vinci’s second consecutive semi-final meet against a member of the Williams family, after downing world No. 1 Serena in the US Open, an upset that denied her a calendar-year Grand Slam and a record-equaling 22nd major title.
Williams — who with 46 career titles has more wins to her name than the other semi-finalists combined — faces Wimbledon finalist Garbine Muguruza today.
Muguruza downed Germany’s Angelique Kerber in two sets 6-4, 7-6 (7/5), despite falling during the second set tie break and injuring her ankle.
The 21-year-old Spaniard and world No. 8 entered the semi-finals as the highest-ranked player, after retirements and shock defeats cleared out the top seeds.
Muguruza will rise to a career-high of No. 5 having made the semi-finals, and would reach No. 4 if she takes the title today.
Williams will re-enter the top 20 after her semi-final performance, and still has an outside chance of qualifying for the season finale in Singapore if she wins at Wuhan and has a strong performance in next week’s China Open.
In the doubles semi-finals, Taiwan’s Chan sisters were defeated 6-2, 6-1 by top seeds Martina Hingis of Switzerland and Sania Mirza of India.
Fourth seeds Chan Hao-ching and Chan Yung-jan failed to convert any of the three break points they created and were ousted in just 53 minutes.
Additional reporting by staff writer
TASHKENT OPEN
Donna Vekic of Croatia beat Evgenia Rodina or Russia 7-5, 6-1 yesterday to set up a Tashkent Open final against Nao Hibino of Japan.
Vekic overcame two breaks of serve in the first set and stepped up her game in the second set, allowing Rodina to win just 15 points in a one-sided contest.
The 19-year-old Vekic won last year’s Malaysian Open and has been ranked as high as 62nd in the world, but is now 137th after a disappointing season.
Vekic is 1-2 in career tour finals, including a loss in the final of the 2012 Tahskent Open to Irina-Camelia Begu.
Hibino beat Bojana Jovanovic of Serbia 6-3, 6-4, staving off a late comeback after her opponent bounced back from 4-1 down to level the second set at 4-4.
SHENZHEN OPEN
Top-seeded Tomas Berdych of Czech Republic defeated countryman Jiri Vesely 6-3, 6-2 in the quarter-finals of the Shenzhen Open yesterday.
Berdych is to take on third-seeded Tommy Robredo in the semi-finals after the Spaniard beat Simone Bolelli of Italy 1-6, 6-2, 6-4.
Second-seeded Marin Cilic of Croatia ended South Korean Chung Hye-on’s run in the tournament with a 7-6 (8/6), 6-4 victory in their quarter-final and next faces Guillermo Garcia-Lopez today after the Spaniard got a walkover against injured Adrian Mannarino.
MALAYSIAN OPEN
Nick Kyrgios won the key points in both tiebreakers to beat third-seeded Ivo Karlovic 7-6 (7/4), 7-6 (7/2) yesterday in the quarter-finals of the Malaysian Open.
The 20-year-old Kyrgios will play second-seeded Feliciano Lopez, who needed two hours to beat eighth-seeded Vasek Pospisil 6-7 (2/7), 6-3, 6-2.
Benjamin Becker upset fourth-seeded Grigor Dimitrov 6-4, 7-6 (7/3) and will take on either top-seeded David Ferrer or Mikhail Kukushkin in the other semi-final today.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier