World No.17 Dinara Safina first upset No.1 Justine Henin at the Qatar Telecom German Open, and on Friday the Russian has continued her impressive run winning a thrilling three-setter over another Grand Slam champion, Serena Williams.
The result shows the excitement of the quarterfinal — 2-6 6-1 7-6(5) — Safina came back from a set down and pulled off the victory in the tiebreaker. Safina described the win over world No.6 Serena Williams as “one of the best matches of my life”.
In the semifinals, seed No.13 Safina will face unseeded Victoria Azarenka of Belarus who defeated the 15th seed Alona Bondarenko of Ukraine 7-6 6-2.
Defending champion Ana Ivanovic played a quarterfinal against Agnes Szavay, but at one set all, the match was called off due to bad light. They will continue the match on Saturday. The winner of the match between Ivanovic and Szavay will meet Elena Dementieva after she beat Jelena Jankovic in an up-and-down 6-3 2-6 6-3 win.
