Johanna Konta has beaten Venus Williams 6-4 7-5 to become the first British woman to compete for the title at the Miami Open.
The 11th seed denied the 36-year-old Williams – a three-time champion starting nearly two decades ago – the chance at a fifth final at what she calls her home event on Thursday.
At Crandon Park, 13 of the past 19 finals have featured at least one of the Williams sisters.
“To get the chance to play Venus again and share the court with her, I always enjoy it,” Konta said on BT Sport 1.
“She is such a world class act so I feel very privileged to have had a battle against her.
“There wasn’t much in it so for me to come through that leaves me feeling very happy and maybe a bit lucky.”
Konta will face off against Caroline Wozniacki, who engineered a massive turnaround against second seed Karolina Pliskova 5-7 6-1 6-1.
Wozniacki, seeded 12th, will be competing in her 45th career final on Saturday.
“It’s definitely special. This is one of the few tournaments where I’ve never made a final,” she sid.
“It’s always been a tournament where I wouldn’t say I’ve struggled but just not had the results that I’ve wanted.
“I’m really pleased to make it this far. There is one more match to go and I’m going to do my best to win that one. But it’s going to be against tough opponents regardless of who I’m playing.”
Wozniacki gave notice of her upset intentions against Pliskova, who beat her in January in Doha, losing a tight first set but bringing the semi-final level as she won the second set on an ace.
“She started off really strongly and had quite a few winners,” Wozniacki said.
“I realised I needed to step it up a bit. I needed to hit it a little bit harder and try and take the ball a little bit earlier.
“I worked my way into the match. It was tough mentally kind of having to pull myself back up. But I got a good start to the second set and kind of went on a roll from there.”
The Dane then ran off with the third to book her third final of the season. She stands 4-1 over the Czech in their career series.
Should she win her 26th title, Wozniacki will re-enter the ranking top 10 on eighth, according to WTA calculations.
with PA
