DUBAI: Top-seeded Angelique Kerber journeyed to her first Dubai Tennis Champ­ionships semi-finals, while Caroline Wozniacki reached her sixth semi at the tournament on Thursday.

Kerber, who is two match wins away from returning to the No 1 ranking, beat Ana Konjuh of Croatia 6-3, 6-2 in the quarter-finals.

Kerber raced to 4-0, and won the remaining games from 2-2 in the second set.

She will play seventh-seeded Elina Svitolina. The Ukrainian improved her career record against Lauren Davis to 4-0 after defeating the American 6-0, 6-4 in the quarterfinals.

Kerber leads Svitolina 5-4 in career meetings, and has used Dubai as a building block to repair her modest early season form.

“I’m really happy about the match today again. Ana is a tough opponent, she’s going for it. You have to play until the last point. It was nice to get through in two sets. I was just focusing on myself and trying to take the rhythm from the last days.”

Svitolina, seeded seventh and winner of a fifth career title this month in Taipei, was pleased to advance.

“I’m really happy the way I started and the way I finished the match, I was being very aggressive and it worked really good,” said Svitolina. “I was calm and positive today. I’m really happy with the performance.”

Wozniacki, who won the Dubai title in 2011, defeated Catherine “Cici” Bellis 6-3, 6-2.

Wozniacki reached the Doha final last week, losing the title to Karolina Pliskova. She’s played nine matches in the last nine days.

Bellis, the youngest player in the draw at 17, scored the biggest win of her six-month-old pro career on Wednesday when she upset her first top-10 player, sixth-ranked Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland.

The American started the match confidently, jumping out to 3-1, but couldn’t sustain the momentum.

“It was really fun for me to see what the highest level is (like),” Bellis said.

In a fight strictly from the baseline, Wozniacki won the next nine games to lead 6-3, 4-0.

“I stepped into the court a little bit after being down 3-1 and just tried to keep the pressure on her, make her think a little bit, not give her too many free points,” said Wozniacki, who had her upper left leg wrapped.

She will play Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia in the semifinals. The 35th-ranked Sevastova ended the week’s last Chinese hope, defeating Wang Qiang 6-4, 7-5 as the Asian lost her first sets of the week.

Published in Dawn, February 25th, 2017