World No.1 Serena Williams fought off a determined Ana Ivanovic on Friday to reach the semi-finals of the WTA hardcourt tournament at Stanford.
The top-seeded American won 2-6 6-3 7-5 and will face eighth-seeded German Andrea Petkovic, who thwarted a possible all-Williams semi with a 6-1 3-6 7-5 triumph over sister Venus.
Serena, playing her first tournament since an early Wimbledon departure with illness, said the almost-two hour match confirmed she had regained her fitness.
“I’m feeling really good. I had some long rallies and I wasn’t out of breath at all, so I was, like, ‘Yay!'”
But former No.1 Ivanovic, seeded fifth, took the opening set in just 25 minutes, but Williams had taken a 5-2 lead with one break of serve in the second even before Ivanovic received on-court treatment for a tight hip after the seventh game.
Although she seemed to be in some discomfort, Ivanovic held serve to narrow the gap to 5-3 before Williams pocketed the second set and broke Ivanovic to open the third.
“It wasn’t very easy,” Williams said. “Ana plays very well. This court is a little fast so she really was hitting a lot of shots. I just fought and stayed in there.”
Trailing 3-1 in the third, Ivanovic won three straight games to take a 4-3 lead.
Williams broke Ivanovic for a 5-4 lead, but was broken herself the next game before finally wrapping it up with one more break of the Serbian’s serve and a dominant service game of her own.
“It was really important for me,” Williams said. “I wanted to come out with the win no matter what, and I’m really excited, actually, that I was able to win today.”
She said she expected a tough match from Petkovic, who stormed through the first set over Venus but Williams, who had earlier beaten fourth seed Victoria Azarenka, won six of the last seven games of the second set to force a decider.
Petkovic twice went up a break in the third only for Williams to break back, but Petkovic won the last two games to seal the win after one hour and 49 minutes.
“She played really well, and I wasn’t as on today as in previous days,” Williams said.
Petkovic said beating both Williams sisters in the same tournament was a tall order.
“You don’t ever have the feeling you have something under control when you play either of them,” she said.
In the other semi-final, third-seeded German Angelique Kerber will play unseeded American Varvara Lepchenko.
Kerber steamrolled Spain’s Garbine Muguruza 6-2 6-1, while Lepchenko – who had ousted second-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska – needed only 51 minutes to dismiss US qualifier Sachia Vickery 6-1 6-0.
