Playing her 54th career Grand Slam quarterfinal, Serena Williams recorded a comfortable 6-3 6-3 victory over Simona Halep at the 2021 Australian Open.
Even though Williams’ early 2-0 lead was quickly neutralized by Halep who leveled to 2-2, the American took control back and won the first set without much trouble.
Seed No.2 Halep was twice up a break in the second set, but never consolidated and from 1-3 down Williams surged through five straight games to triumph in one hour and 21 minutes.
Williams’ semifinal opponent will be third seed Naomi Osaka, who cruised past doubles world No.1 Hsieh Su-Wei 6-2 6-2 earlier on Tuesday. Osaka never pays attention to draws, but this time she couldn’t escape the information about her next opponent as everyone was talking about it:
Normally, I never look at my draw. But everyone has told me about my draw here, so I kind of had no choice but to know who my next opponent is. It’s definitely going to be really fun.
Top-half quarterfinals will be played on Wednesday: Ashleigh Barty vs. Karolina Muchova and Jennifer Brady vs. Jessica Pegula.
