Wozniacki next meets second-seeded German Angelique Kerber, who was a 7-5 6-0 victor over Italy’s Roberta Vinci.
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Wozniacki reached her fifth U.S. Open semifinal, and first at any Grand Slam tournament in two years, by beating an injured Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia 6-0, 6-2 on Tuesday night.
She lost U.S. Open finals in 2009 against Kim Clijsters and 2014 against Serena Williams. She will be overtaken on Monday by current No. 2 Angelique Kerber, who plays Caroline Wozniacki in Thursday’s second semifinal.
Kerber – the Australian Open champion who also finished as runner-up at Wimbledon – confessed that stepping onto the court knowing she was world number one made it hard to concentrate. “I know that I can beat everybody, and this is what gives me also a lot of confidence and motivation for going out there and playing with a lot of emotion”.
Caroline Wozniacki, derailed this year by an ankle injury which sent her career into a tailspin, and Anastasija Sevastova, who quit the sport three years ago, set up a US Open quarter-final duel. “I think she does an unbelievable job keeping the balls deep in the court, so you feel like you can’t dictate the point right away, which I think makes people go for things too soon”. “But it just feels so good to me to be out on the big court and somewhere where I feel so comfortable and familiar”, concluded a smiling Wozniacki.
Wozniacki – who began the tournament at 74 in the WTA standings – created six break-point opportunities in the opening set but she was only required to take one of them as Keys struggled to make an impact on the Dane’s serve. “The main thing is that when I’m on court I have to believe in myself”.
Pliskova said she knew facing Serena would be “a little bit about the same match” as playing Venus.
In Wednesday’s other semi-final, second seed and 2012 champion Andy Murray takes on 2014 runner-up, No. 6 seed Kei Nishikori.
“I’m just working my way through”, Wozniacki said. She eliminated 2004 champion Svetlana Kuznetsova in the second round and No. 8 Madison Keys in the fourth.
But one thing Keys has proved this week is you can never count her out. “She’s number two. So probably this is the difference between us”, said Vinci.
“Now I’m a completely different player. Because when she’s on fire, she’s on fire, and there is not much you can do about it”, said Wozniacki discussing her gameplan for the fourth round encounter. Wozniacki was once a No. 1 – in 2010 and 2011.
The German second seed showed remarkable powers of resilience to retrieve three breaks of serve against Italian 33-year-old Vinci in the first set. “Yeah, it’s really all I’m focused on right now”.
The 26-year-old is projected to improve to 28th in the world by reaching the semi-finals. Nothing against Wozniacki and her shot making skills, but it isn’t going to challenge the world No.2.
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“For sure it was affecting my play, but I’m not a person that likes to retire during a match so I just tried my best”, Sevastova said.
