US veteran Lindsay Davenport and Frances Amelie Mauresmo, the first and second seeds, posted victories here on Thursday to rech the semi-finals of a 600,00-dollar WTA hard-court tournament. The 26-year-old Frenchwoman had an easy day at the office, dispatching Germanys Anna-Lena Groenefeld 6-3, 6-2.
Davenport had to work a little harder for her 6-2, 7-6 (7/5) victory over Slovakian Daniela Hantuchova. Mauresmo now meets Spains Anabel Medina Garrigues on Friday while Davenport is slated to play Russian Anna Chakvetadze, a 6-4, 6-4 victor over Chinas Zheng Jie.
Mauresmo and Davenport are now one match away from a repeat of their Wimbledon semi-final clash in July, when Davenport edged Mauresmo in a three-set duel made more tense by an overnight rain delay.
Should she reach the final, Davenport will also regain the world number one ranking just a week after she surrendered it to Russian Maria Sharapova.
Davenport, who is competing here for the first time after a back injury sidelined her much of the summer, cruised through the first set against Hantuchova only to fall behind 3-0 in the second.
She regrouped to reel off five straight games but failed to serve out the contest at 5-4. She prevailed in the tie-breaker after her opponent committed three straight unforced errors to hand over the victory.
"I was really happy with the way I started out today," Davenport said. "I wanted to change what happened the other night where I got off to a little bit of a slow kind of lackadaisical start.
Davenport said it was good to be tested prior to the US Open.
"Its about playing matches," she said. "It would be wrong of me to expect that I can come out after seven or eight weeks and be perfect. Tough second sets like today can only help me for the US Open." Earlier Thursday, Spain's Anabel Medina Garrigues ousted Russian fourth seed Elena Dementieva 6-4, 6-3.
The defeat seemed to bode ill for Dementieva's hopes of reaching a second straight US Open final.
A finalist both at Flushing Meadows and the French Open last year, Dementieva has reached the semi-finals in just one of her last seven events.
Seeded sixth for the US Open, the final Grand Slam of the year that starts on Monday, she has won only half of her last eight matches.
However, she seemed unperturbed.
"Im definitely not a morning person," Dementieva said. "To play at 10 oclock, that means you have to wake up at six. You are not fast enough because its early morning. It just wasnt my day today."
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