ST. PETERSBURG, Russia (AP) Roberta Vinci survived a scare from Timea Babos of Hungary to reach the St. Petersburg Ladies Trophy semifinals on Friday.
Vinci broke Babos when the latter was serving for the match in the deciding set, and bounced back from 4-2 down in the tiebreak to win 7-6 (3), 4-6, 7-6 (4).
Vinci struggled throughout the first and second sets, landing fewer than half of her first serves.
''She served so good, but today I played so-so. Especially at the beginning, I was so tight, so nervous,'' Vinci said in televised comments. ''I stayed focused and I won a great match.''
The second-seeded Vinci meets fourth-seeded Ana Ivanovic in the semifinals after the Serb beat Ukrainian qualifier Kateryna Kozlova 6-1, 7-5. Ivanovic limited Kozlova to just 10 points in the whole of a rapid first set but faced a tougher task when Kozlova broke her serve twice in the second.
''She is a great young player, and in the second set she started to play more powerful,'' Ivanovic said. ''I tried to step up a bit, be more aggressive, hold my court position, and it worked well.''
