Serena Williams, Justine Henin to meet in Australian Open final

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Top seed Serena Williams and returning wildcard Justine Henin eliminated their Chinese semifinal opponents to book their first meeting in a Grand Slam final.

World No.1 Serena Williams advanced to her fifth Australian Open final after a tense victory over seed No.16 Li Na. The Chinese showed great resistance to take the defending champion to two tiebreaks, but crumbled in both to lose 7-6(4) 7-6(1).

Unseeded former world No.1 Justine Henin blew Zheng Jie off court in just 51 minutes with a 6-1 6-0 victory in the semifinals. The 35th-ranked Zheng had very good first serve percentage of 81, and the score was that bad. Imagine what would have happened if her serve was worse.

Williams and Henin faced each other for the first time nine years ago. Only four of their encounters were in a WTA final in which they are tied at 2-2, and they are about to have their first one in a major. Williams leads their head-to-head record 7-6.

12 COMMENTS

  1. Allez, Justine-tie it up to 7-7 and win your next major!
    Fell asleep during her match and can’t find any bits on youtube =(

  2. These are my two least favourite players and I never thought I would have to choose either of them to cheer for. I would choose Serena a thousand times over, but I think that Justine will just shade it. Hopefully it will be a good match. Come on Serena!!! 🙂

  3. So Serena came on top this time (!) but I think Justine has nothing to be disappointed about. She had much harder draw and had to grind her way to the top through players like Dementieva, Wickermayer, Petrova who are no lightweights. Allez Justine, in the next match I am sure things will change. I think she still can be only proud of herself for her achievements. If somebody should be worried it’s people like Sharapova, Ivanovic and yes, Clisjters, who totally bombed out there.

  4. Kudos to Justine Henin in reaching the Aussie Open final. I watched the match and I have to say that Justine played a very risky game attacking Serena Williams ….. She went for broke but in some tight situations it didn’t work out…. She needs to really improve her serve coz that’s one thing that puts her down a bit…. But i’m pretty sure that it will bring a lot of good things to Justine!

  5. I rooted for Serena this time, just felt like it. She deserved that Grand Slam, she’s the best right now. As for Justine, her comeback results are more than satisfactory, and she will win tournaments pretty soon for sure.

  6. Serena was vindicated after being robbed in NY,she showed her mettle.Justine tried but her best was not good enough to beat a hobbled Serena.The American is fast distancing herself from the pack,and soon she will reach 15 slams.That goes to show that Kimmy win has an asterisk attached to it.

  7. I agree with you Fyoto, will Kim ever win all
    slams in a year? nope not likely, Hell I never
    want Henin to win Wimbledon ever I want that
    to elude her, like the French open eluded
    Martina hingis lol..I just hope Serena or
    Venus are ready in the clay court season and
    don’t have to play either kim, or henin in the
    draw. I say put them on the same side again
    and let them knock each other out!!!

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