Wozniacki rolls past Mertens into women’s final
No. 2 seed coasts at first, then has to rally to hold off unseeded Mertens
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA >> Caroline Wozniacki has reached the Australian Open final for the first time with a 6-3, 7-6 (2) win Thursday (Australia time) over Elise Mertens, moving within one win of a Grand Slam breakthrough.
It’s her first Grand Slam final anywhere outside of the United States, where she lost U.S. Open finals in 2009 (to Kim Clijsters) and 2014 (to Serena Williams).
Wozniacki appeared to be coasting against the 22-yearold Mertens, getting breaks in the middle of each set. But she began getting tight when she was serving for the match at 5-4: From 30-15, she double-faulted twice and Mertens passed her with a forehand winner in between to make it 5-5.
The No. 37-ranked Mertens lifted, holding her serve at love and then having two set points in the next game before Wozniacki eventually held a game that lasted almost 8 minutes.
Wozniacki dominated the tiebreaker and put memories of her last Australian Open semifinal behind her she had match points against Li Na in the semifinal in 2011, but was unable to convert.
This time, experience helped.
“It means so much to me. I got really tight at 5-4. I kind of felt head against the wall,” she said. “I knew I had to try and stay calm.
“Once she had set points. I thought, `OK, now you just have to go for it ... she’s nervous now too.”
• Roger Federer got cranky at the chair umpire for a technology flaw in his quarterfinal match, using the rare emotional outburst as motivation.
It helped. The 36-yearold Federer, now the oldest semifinalist in Melbourne in 41 years, beat long-time rival Tomas Berdych 7-6 (1), 6-3, 6-4 Wednesday and will next face a challenge from the next generation.
That will be against 21-year-old Hyeon Chung, the first South Korean to reach a Grand Slam semifinal and the youngest to reach the last four at a major since 2010.
Federer’s victory extended his winning streak to 14 in Australian Open quarterfinals and to nine in a personal rivalry with Berdych that dates back to 2004. The 19-time major champion leads that headto-head
contest 20-6, including all five meetings at Melbourne Park.
Federer had to overcome a shaky start, dropping his opening service game and uncharacteristically questioning chair umpire Fergus Murphy because of a technological fault. With Berdych serving for the
first set in the ninth game, Federer had challenged a line call.
After a lengthy delay, Murphy called the control room and confirmed the replay graphic couldn’t be displayed on the stadium screen, and also that the original decision stood. When he added that Federer had no challenges remaining for the set, Federer approached the chair and the crowd cheers intensified.
“Yeah, but you can’t steal my challenge,” Federer told Murphy. “Do you feel comfortable with this? You’re OK with it?”
Seven points later, he eventually broke Berdych to get back on serve, and then won the tiebreaker. The match was as good as over.
The 58th-ranked Chung is the lowest-ranked man to reach the Australian Open semifinals since Marat Safin in 2004.
With Chung already through, and Kyle Edmund playing No. 6 Marin Cilic in the other half of the draw, it’s the first time since 1999 that multiple unseeded players have reached the Australian Open semifinals.
• After losing in the Australian Open quarterfinals, Tennys Sandgren saved his final shot of the tournament for the media.
Sandgren opened his news conference following a 6-4, 7-6 (5), 6-3 loss to Chung by reading a prepared statement directed at the media that has scrutinized his Twitter feed during his unexpected run at Melbourne Park.
“With a handful of follows and some likes on Twitter, my fate has been sealed in your minds,” Sandgren said, reading from his mobile phone. “To write an edgy story, to create sensationalist coverage, there are a few lengths you wouldn’t go to mark me as the man you desperately want me to be.”
Before he scrubbed his Twitter history on Tuesday, Sandgren’s tweets had included one saying the unfounded “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory linking Democrats to a child-sex ring at a Washington pizzeria was “sickening and the collective evidence is too much to ignore.”