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| Serena Williams: marches into Australian Open semi-final |
Serena Williams has booked a semi-final ticket in the Australian Open, after ending Britain’s Johanna Konta’s run in two sets.
The American, with 22 Grand Slams in her bag, beat Konta 6-2 6-3 in the second semi-final of the day. She will next meet Mirjana Lucic-Baroni, who had earlier beaten Karolina Pliskova.
It will be the first time that three over 30 year old players will feature in the Australian Open semi-finals. Venus Williams who qualified on Tuesday beating Anastia Pavlyuchenka is 36 years old. Her next match will be against fellow American Coco Vandeweghe, who is 25 years old.
Mirjana Lucic-Baroni, a Croatian tennis player is 34 years old and Serena is 35.
Serena in her match against Konta at the Rod Laver Arena, was never in danger of losing except for a slight wobble early in the second set, in the third game.
Konta won three straight points to go from down 40-15 to advantage. But she used all her experience to power through and remain on serve. She now went further to break Konta in her own game, the third time Konta was broken in the Australian Open.
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Serena, arguably the best tennis player of her generation now has a record 34th grand slam semi-final. She is also now just two matches away to win a possible record 23 Grand Slam title and seventh Australian title.
Williams won 88 percent of her first serves and notched 10 aces with an overpowering performance.
Konta committed 22 unforced errors and failed to take advantage of the few opportunities that presented themselves.
Williams finished the match with four straight points in the final game.
“She’s definitely a future champion here for sure,” Serena said about Konta, in a court-side interview after the match.
A disappointed Konta goes back home unable to match her run to the semi-final at Melbourne Park 12 months ago.
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