Yaroslava Shvedova is no stranger to reaching the latter stages of Grand Slam tournaments as she made the quarterfinals of Wimbledon this year losing to Williams’ sister Venus and reached the quarterfinals of the French Open twice losing to former world number one Jelena Jankovic and two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova in 2010 and 2012.
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At 36-years-old and the oldest remaining player in the draw, Williams battled until the bitter end as her 24-year-old Czech opponent needed five match points and almost two-and-a-half hours.
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Over her career, she is 308-42 at the majors, for a winning percentage of.880.
“I was prepared that I’m going to play Venus, it’s going to be tough because people will be cheering for her”, Pliskova said.
It took her a while to finish off this one, despite going up an early break in the third set and leading 4-2.
Pliskova then broke Williams for a 6-5 lead – with the help of a favourable net cord bounce.
The six-time US Open champion is the heavy favourite to win this match, and Williams has a good serve which has been working well on the courts in NY along with returning well, and getting cheap points by serving aces out wide and down the T. After Pliskova frittered away one with a double-fault, Williams steeled herself and stepped up, smacking a volley victor, cross-court backhand victor and two forehand winners to break back for 6-all.
“In the breaker, I went for a little bit more, but I didn’t put the ball in enough”, said the 36-year-old American, whose seven Grand Slam titles include two US Opens.
Williams will have a day off before tackling Simona Halep after the fifth-seeded Romanian’s 6-2, 7-5 victory over Spain’s Carla Suarez Navarro. Jimmy Connors was 174th when he made a stirring run to the semifinals in NY at age 39 in 1991. Murray defeated Nishikori in the semifinals of the Rio Olympics last month en route to an unprecedented second consecutive singles gold medal.
In the quarterfinals, del Potro’s opponent will be No. 3 Wawrinka, a 6-4, 6-1, 6-7 (5), 6-3 victor against Illya Marchenko.
“Wow, it’s really exciting”, Williams said of moving out of a tie with Swiss great Federer for most Grand Slam match wins. “I got the power from the crowd in every match”.
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With Kerber through to the quarter-finals, Williams must reach the final to add a 187th week to her current reign, and if Kerber makes the championship match, Williams will have to beat her to stay top.
