Venus Williams in Pan Pacific Open semifinals
Venus Williams beat 19-year old Canadian Eugenie Bouchard 6-3, 6-7 (4), 6-3 on Thursday at Ariake Colosseum to advance to the Pan Pacific Open semifinals for the first time.
Williams, who hasn’t been impressive in the tournament since reaching quarter-finals in Tokyo in 2004, broke Bouchard with a forehand down the line to go up 5-2 in the third set and held on to win the match that lasted three hours.
The 19-year-old Bouchard put Williams on notice when she built a 3-1 lead in the quarterfinals, but Williams fought back to break her three times in their first meeting.
Williams will face Petra Kvitova in the semifinals. The seventh-seeded Czech beat Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-4, 6-1.
In other results, fourth-seeded Caroline Wozniacki beat Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic 2-6, 6-3, 6-2 to set up a semifinal with fifth-seeded Angelique Kerber of Germany, who ousted second-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland 6-4, 6-4. Wozniacki and Kerber are 3-3 in head-to-head matches. Wozniacki won their semifinal match at Indian Wells in March.