Serena Williams dug herself out of a hole while big sister Venus put herself in one during an eventful Australian Open women’s quarter-finals yesterday.
Defending champion Serena was teetering on the brink of an early departure when she trailed Belarus’s Victoria Azarenka 4-6, 0-4.
The world No. 1 was struggling to match the power and aggression of the 20-year-old from Minsk, who also had Serena on the ropes in the fourth round last year before retiring with illness.
PHOTO: REUTERS
But Serena showed all her renowned fighting qualities as she came out swinging, winning 12 of the next 16 games to somehow overhaul Azarenka 4-6, 7-6 (7/4), 6-2.
She next plays Chinese 16th seed Li Na, who performed a similar escape act against Venus in the first match on Rod Laver Arena.
The imposing Venus blitzed her way through the first set and led 5-3 in the second before imploding under an avalanche of unforced errors, virtually handing the match to the gritty Li 2-6, 7-6 (7/4), 7-5.
PHOTO: AFP
Serena said she surprised even herself with her fightback.
“I didn’t expect to win when I was down 0-4 — I was like ‘well at least I am still in the doubles’,” she said. “But I never really count myself out.”
With her left knee and right thigh bandaged, Williams was run all around the court by Azarenka.
At 0-4 in the second set, and having not won a point on the Azarenka serve in the set until then, Williams cut a dejected figure and seemed only moments from elimination.
However, all the sudden her game returned to its dominant best.
“I knew if I could just do a little better and make a little less errors — I made a lot — I knew I could be better,” Serena said.
Azarenka had no answer to the power surge, with Williams hitting 57 winners to her 22.
Li and Venus made 110 unforced errors between them in a poor quality match that will be best remembered for the drama of the fluctuating third set, which featured nine breaks of serve.
Li started nervously and seemed overwhelmed by the occasion as she wilted badly in the first set.
She lost the set in just 30 minutes and was in real trouble when Venus was serving for the match at 5-3 in the second.
But Li began to swing freely and Venus tightened up, losing her serve, then the set in a tiebreak.
This signalled the start of a see-sawing final set in which both players struggled to hold serve — at one stage there were six consecutive breaks.
Li finally held and came out to serve for the match, only to be broken, but Williams dropped her serve straight away, giving Li another chance.
This time she made no mistake as another unforced error from the American gave her the match.
In the men’s singles Roger Federer withstood a stern challenge from Nikolay Davydenko before mounting a furious counter-attack to win 2-6, 6-3, 6-0, 7-5 to advance to the semi-finals.
Down a set and a break in the second, the Swiss top seed turned the match in the blink of an eye, winning 13 consecutive games to take the next two sets, then keeping the Russian at bay in the fourth.
Davydenko, was immaculate early, breaking Federer three times to wrap up the first set and race to a 3-1 lead in the second.
When given four chances to take a two-break lead, the Russian blew them all, following a double-fault with three consecutive unforced errors.
Federer, sensing the shift in momentum, pounced.
At the end of a breathtaking half-hour of near faultless shot-making, the Swiss master emerged a set up with a 2-0 lead in the fourth, while Davydenko was left reeling.
However, the Russian rallied, firing three winners in a row to save match point and break back to 5-5.
The Swiss maestro bided his time, though, to take the break back, then dispatched Davydenko with a thumping serve after setting up match point with an ace.
In yesterday’s other men’s quarter-final Jo-Wilfried Tsonga fought back from two sets to one down to beat third seed Novak Djokovic 7-6, 6-7, 1-6, 6-3, 6-1.
Tsonga looked down and out after the third set but rallied to beat the Serb after three hours 52 minutes.
Meanwhile, Taiwan’s Huang Liang-chi and Japan’s Yasutaka Uchiyama defeated the Russian pair Victor Baluda and Richard Muzaev 3-6, 7-6 (7-3) , 10-6 yesterday to advance to the boys’ doubles semi-final in Melbourne.
Huang is the only Taiwanese player left in the event after Chuang Chia-jung and Slovakian partner Filip Polasek lost 6-3, 3-6, 12-10 yesterday to Lisa Raymond of the US and Wesley Moodie of South Africa in their mixed doubles quarter-final. Chuang’s loss meant that all the Taiwanese players were eliminated from the senior level competition.
Huang and Uchiyama will meet the German pair Kevin Krawietz and Dominik Schulz in the semis.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CNA, WITH STAFF
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