The third day of the TEB BNP Parbias WTA Championships has come to a close and we have one certain semifinalist – Serena Williams, not surprisingly. In the Red Group semi Serena will be joined by either Petra Kvitova or Angelique Kerber, while in the White Group two of Li Na, Jelena Jankovic and Victoria Azarenka will make the final four. As you can conclude, so far the certain losers are Sara Errani and Agnieszka Radwanska with two defeats each.
The first match on Thursday’s schedule was a long clash of Li and Jankovic, which was peculiar in many ways: throughout the match none of the players won less than two successive games, the loser Jankovic had a better winners-to-unforced errors differential and was much better on break point conversions (55% to Li’s 28%), but it was crucial that Li earned 21 break points and converted six to Jankovic’s five out of nine and won three straight games from 3-all in the decider. Final score: 6-3 2-6 6-3.
Later on, Angelique Kerber recorded her first career victory at the tournament, having gone 0-3 last year and having lost to Serena Williams on Tuesday, with a 6-2 6-2 triumph over Agnieszka Radwanska.
In the last match on Thursday’s schedule, Serena Williams scored her third victory at the 2013 edition of the season-ending Championships with a 6-2 6-3 win over Petra Kvitova, who, as I hear from a poster in my Women’s Tennis Fans Facebook group, happens to already be living with her boyfriend Radek Stepanek. (photo: © Neal Trousdale)
