TNT Sports
Davenport survives scare
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Published 27/01/2005 at 09:59 GMT
Lindsay Davenport booked her place first major championship final since winning the Australian Open in 2000, with an out-of-sorts 2-6 7-6 (7-5) 6-4 victory over 19th seed Nathalie Dechy on Thursday. The world number one looked sluggish after singles and d
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Davenport said afterwards she had got a bit of luck in her quarter-final victory over Alicia Molik and today as well. "I got a little yesterday and today, but I'll take it," a relieved Davenport smiled in an on-court interview.
With her left thigh heavily strapped Davenport got off to a terrible start, gifting the Frenchwoman the first set in only 24 minutes with a string of uncharacteristic errors, particularly on the backhand wing.
Dechy continued to expose her 28-year-old opponent's lack of pace and it was only Davenport's powerful serving and 11 aces overall in the match that got her out of trouble.
The American did enough to force a second-set tiebreak, but even then looked edgy, trailing Dechy 2-4.
Unfortunately 25-year-old Dechy tensed up and Davenport seized control taking the tie-break 7-5 on a double fault.
The top seed then stuttered through the final set adding to her 52 unforced errors, but broke her French opponent to love in the final game of the third set to set up a final clash on Saturday with Serena Williams, the 2003 champion.
"I'm a little perplexed," Davenport said. "I don't think I'm playing well but I'm in the final. I got lucky but I'll take it."
While Dechy recognised Davenport's big-match experience as the key to her victory.
"Maybe she handled the tight moments a little bit better than I did," Dechy said afterwards.
"She's able to play such a high quality level of tennis and on the really close points, she was serving really well, she was going completely for them and making some good shots.
"That's why she's there at the top. That's why she's so tough to play on hard court.
"You can always replay the match and redo the match 10 times, but it's over. I did the best I could and I'm really happy about this experience."
Dechy could rank as high as 13th when the world lists are announced on Monday.
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