Australian Open gallery, Day 10

 

Originally published on: 26/02/10 15:20

With temperatures ever climbing in Melbourne, it was all about the heat on day 10 of the Aussie Open.

Serena Williams survived her second close shave by coming back from a set down against Svetlana Kuznetsova in their quarter-final.

Afterwards, all the talk was whether the Rod Laver Arena roof closing after the first set changed the course of the match.

One look at the 5-7, 7-5, 6-1 scoreline tells you theres no need for rocket scientists to get back to us on that one

While everyone else was huffing and puffing, though, the superb form of Elena Dementieva continued, the Russian breezing into the semis thanks to a 6-2, 6-2 demolition of Spanish giant killer Carla Suarez Navarro.

Later on, Fernando Verdasco proved Mondays win over Andy Murray was no fluke when he beat his second top five seed this week with a four-set success story against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.

As I type, world No.1 and top seed Rafa Nadal is well on his way to a semi-final appointment against Verdasco. Hes up two sets to love against Gilles Simon, having saved a set point in set two.

A victory for Rafa would guarantee a Spanish finalist, an interesting point given no Spanish man has won the Aussie Open. Not yet, anyway

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