Murray, Konta reach Aussie semis
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ANDY Murray and a much lesser-known British player, Johanna Konta, advanced to the Australian Open semifinals yesterday.
Murray beat David Ferrer 6-3, 6-7 (5), 6-2, 6-3 to reach his 18th a grand slam semifinal. Konta, who is making her debut in the main draw at the season’s first major, had a 6-4, 6-1 win over Chinese qualifier Zhang Shuai.
It’s the first time since the December 1977 version of the Australian Open that two British players — John Lloyd and Sue Barker that year — have advanced to the final four of any major.
Konta, the first British woman to reach a grand slam semifinal since Jo Durie at the 1983 US Open, will play Angelique Kerber, who beat two-time champion Victoria Azarenka 6-3, 7-5. Born in Australia but living in Britain since her early teens, the 24-year-old Konta also has Hungarian citizenship and calls herself a “tri-citizen.”
The No. 2-ranked Murray, who has lost four finals at Melbourne Park, will meet Milos Raonic in the semifinals. The 25-year-old Canadian beat Gael Monfils 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 in a night match, continuing his strong form that has seen him beat Roger Federer in the Brisbane International final and French Open champion Stan Wawrinka in the fourth round here.
Novak Djokovic and Federer will contest the other semifinal.
Six-time champion Serena Williams and No. 4-ranked Agnieszka Radwanska will meet in the other women’s semifinal, also today.
Murray’s match with Ferrer involved plenty of long rallies. Two of them — at 27 and 31 shots in length — came during the second-set tiebreaker, and Murray lost both of those points. But the Scotsman moved out to a 4-1 lead in the third set, during which there was a brief break when the roof on Rod Laver Arena was closed because of an approaching thunderstorm. Murray liked it with a roof over his head.
“That helped me a little bit,” Murray said. “I like playing indoors. I think it was actually good for us to have a little bit of a break. We played some brutal rallies at the end of the second set and the beginning of the third.”
Murray and Raonic, who advanced to his second grand slam semi, he lost in the final four at Wimbledon to Federer in 2014, are 3-3 in career meetings.
“I think just the perseverance throughout it, I had a lot of opportunities even in that set I lost,” Raonic said. “I just said to myself keep making opportunities and hopefully they’ll go my way.”
Kerber went down a break in the second set before winning five consecutive games and saving five set points before beating Azarenka, the result coming as a surprise despite the difference in seedings.
No. 7 Kerber broke No. 14 Azarenka’s serve to end the match, her first win in seven matches against the Belarussian.
“When I was down 2-5, I was actually playing more aggressive,” Kerber said.
Kerber poses a formidable roadblock to Konta. Nearly 17 years have passed since Steffi Graf won Germany’s last grand slam title, and Kerber said she had sought inspiration from the 46-year-old in Las Vegas last year.
“Steffi is a champion. She taught me to believe in myself. She was and still is my idol,” Kerber said of Graf, who won 22 grand slam titles — an Open-era record that Serena Williams is gunning to match in Melbourne.
“She won everything, she’s a great person, as well.
“I was able to practice with her for a few days just before Indian Wells last year. But she taught me actually that I’m on a good way and to try to believe in myself. I was trying to do it in the last few months.
“I was going out there today with a lot of confidence and trying to believe really in myself and just going for my shots, trying to play good tennis.
“I’m happy about my game, how I’m playing today.”
Kerber is the first German into the last four at the Australian Open since Anke Huber in 1998.
Germany’s six-time grand slam winner Boris Becker, who won the Australian Open in 1991 and 1996, praised Kerber for her fighting spirit. “Angie is a fighter. She has managed to get her nerves under control and to believe in herself,” the 48-year-old Becker, who coaches Novak Djokovic, said.
Graf is now married to Andre Agassi.
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