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Kournikova wins in Shanghai Posted: Friday September 13, 2002 9:44 AMSHANGHAI (Reuters) -- Russia's Anna Kournikova inched closer to her first career singles title on Friday after a hard-fought quarter-final victory in the WTA Shanghai Open. The fourth-seeded Kournikova was stretched by a surprisingly resilient Jelena Kostanic of Croatia, needing nearly two hours to secure a 7-5 6-4 win. Despite trailing in both sets, Kournikova said she had never really been worried. "She was the lucky one today. I tried to use her weak spots and I think that worked a lot for me. She couldn't really hurt me a lot," Kournikova told reporters. "I just had to make her move and play it out." In Saturday's semi-final, the glamour girl of tennis will play Ai Sugiyama of Japan, the number two seed, who trounced fifth-seeded Italian Adriana Serra-Zanetti 6-1 6-3. Kournikova said she had not played Sugiyama for some time, but added that she was familiar with the power game favoured by the smaller Japanese player. "I'm going to have to play aggressive and use my game, because she's going to be very consistent. She's going to be like a wall, I'm going to have to figure out how to break her game apart," Kournikova said. "She's a fighter." Top seed Anna Smashnova of Israel also booked a place in the semi-finals after crushing Miho Saeki of Japan 6-3 6-2. Smashnova will play Argentine Clarisa Fernandez or Indonesian Angelique Widjaja, best known for embarrassing Kournikova in the first round of the U.S. Open, in the last four. Copyright 2003 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. |
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