World number three Venus Williams recorded her 18th-straight tour win at the Australian women's hardcourt tennis championship on the Gold Coast today.
The top-seed hit nine aces past Japanese eighth-seed Ai Sugiyama in her 6-2, 6-4 quarter-final win.
The reigning Wimbledon and US Open champion is scheduled to play unseeded Russian Nadia Petrova in tomorrow’s semi-final.
Petrova injured a shoulder in her 7-6 (7/4), 7-5 win over Italian Silvia Farina-Elia and will decide whether to risk the troubled shoulder against Williams after a warm-up tomorrow.
Belgian world Number 7 Justine Henin will meet Czech Daja Bedanova in the other semi-final after cruising past German qualifier Anca Barna 6-2, 6-1.
Bedanova was handed an easy victory after Slovenia's Tina Pisnik retired with a strained right quad muscle at 3-0 in the second set after losing the first set 1-6.
AFP