DUBAI, Feb 22: Wimbledon champion Amelie Mauresmo celebrated equal prize money for women at the British Grand Slam with a courageous performance to reach the semi-finals of the 1.5-million-dollar Dubai Open here on Thursday.

Second seed Mauresmo won 6-3, 3-6, 6-4 against Daniela Hantuchova, the eighth-seeded Slovakian to whom she had lost twice in their four previous meetings, and did so despite her tiredness and heavy strappings on both thighs.

The French heroine had flown to the Gulf only on Monday after answering a last moment call to rescue a depleted tournament, and although she appeared to be feeling the pace of her schedule and of the contest in the second set, she rallied cleverly to snatch the result.

“I kind of felt sleepy in the second set, perhaps because I was so much in control in the first set and it made things look so easy,” Mauresmo reckoned.

But in fact Hantuchova, who went 0-3 and love 40 down in no time, improved, keeping more of her raking drives in court, at the same time as Mauresmo began to struggle a little physically

“The strappings are only a precaution,” she claimed. “I felt really okay most of the time. But she had a hard serve and it gave me a lot of trouble today and I thought I could have done a lot better in that area of the game.”

Although Hantuchova often did serve well on the bigger points there were still plenty of long and varied rallies, and Mauresmo's “sleepiness” appeared to come after the blow of a line decision in the second set.

Leading 3-2 Mauresmo was adjudged to have delivered an ace, but Hantuchova appealed to the computerized replay and succeeded in getting the decision over-turned.

On replaying the point Mauresmo served a double fault to go love thirty down, and shortly afterwards dropped that service game to go 2-4 down.

Hantuchova clung to that advantage well to take the second set and looked the more likely winner when she advanced to 3-2 in a final set in which service breaks became more frequent.

But Mauresmo mixed up the pace much more cleverly and also scored well by changing the direction of her backhand drives suddenly to the short route, down the line.

Although Hantuchova saved three break points to reach to 4-4, she could not escape trouble a second time, and at 30-40 in the tenth game Mauresmo sent over a provocative, loopy drive when Hantuchova battered over the baseline.

Quarter-finals:

Amelie Mauresmo (2), France, def. Daniela Hantuchova (8), Slovakia, 6-3, 3-6, 6-4; Jelena Jankovic (5), Serbia, def. Martina Hingis (4), Switzerland, 7-6 (3), 6-2.—AFP