Al Bello/Getty Images"Caroline in the City" has been renewed for another round. Wozniacki defeated Andrea Petkovic in straight sets to advance to the semis, where she'll face Serena.NEW YORK -- The sun finally shone at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, but that didn't stop the two-day deluge here from messing with the schedule for a third consecutive day at the U.S. Open. With water from the rains bubbling up through the Louis Armstrong Stadium court, matches had to be moved to the outer courts on Thursday.
That's how Caroline Wozniacki, the No. 1-ranked player in the world and top seed here, found herself playing on Court 13 in front of an intimate gathering of about 584, the capacity out there. "A lousy court," is what tournament referee Brian Earley called it before moving Andy Roddick's match with David Ferrer there earlier in the day. Wozniacki and No. 10 Andrea Petkovic followed.
"Andy Roddick was playing on Court 13 as well," Wozniacki said after beating Petkovic 6-1, 7-6 (5). "I heard somebody say the last nine years he hasn't been playing on any other courts than this one [Arthur Ashe Stadium]. If he's not complaining, I'm not complaining either.
"It actually reminded me of juniors; to be honest I prefer to play on this one [Ashe], definitely. I don't want to go back to juniors."
With Thursday's win, Wozniacki guaranteed she will be heading back to the big stage and a defining match with 13-time Grand Slam champion Serena Williams on Saturday.
Petkovic was thought to be a tough challenge for Wozniacki, who had struggled in a fourth-round, three-set victory against Svetlana Kuznetsova on Monday night.
But Petkovic didn't make a match of it until the second set, when she broke Wozniacki three times including in the ninth game, when Wozniacki was serving for the match at 5-3. But Petkovic had 44 unforced errors overall, and it ultimately cost her in the tiebreaker.
"Caroline, she did what she always does: She forced me to [make] errors in the tiebreak," Petkovic said. "I gave a little bit too many presents, three or four unforced errors, and that's the difference against her."
Stosured again: Another top seed tumbled as No. 2 Vera Zvonareva was dismissed by No. 9 Samantha Stosur, 6-3, 6-3, on Thursday. Although Zvonareva made the finals here last year, this was hardly an upset. Stosur took a 7-2 series advantage into the match, and had won seven in a row dating to 2007. Now it's eight in a row.
"It's part of tennis," Stosur said. "Obviously, I've got a great record against Vera, and then not-so-good records against other players. I think it's just the way your game can match up against certain people.
"Obviously having this record makes me feel pretty confident going into each match."
And that made for a rare easy day for Stosur, who dispatched of Zvonareva in 1 hour, 7 minutes. Stosur had labored longer than any other player to make it to the quarterfinals. She needed 3 hours, 16 minutes to beat Nadia Petrova 7-6, 6-7, 7-5 in the third round, a U.S. Open record for women. Stosur followed that by playing the longest women's tiebreaker in tournament history in a 6-2, 6-7 (15), 6-3 fourth-round victory against Maria Kirilenko. Stosur played a total of 8 hours, 35 minutes to reach the quarterfinals. By contrast, Serena Williams disposed of her opponents in 4 hours, 49 minutes through the first four rounds.
Kerber? Really? Angelique Kerber of Germany, the 92nd-ranked player in the world, is in the top four at the U.S. Open. She continued her stellar run here, beating No. 26 seed Flavia Pennetta 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 in the quarterfinals to advance to a semifinal match with Stosur. Kerber has never reached a Grand Slam semifinal before and prior to this U.S. Open, she hadn't made a quarterfinal, either. In fact, she had lost in the first round of her last four Slams, and in 10 of the 16 she had played in her career.
Even Kerber can't believe she's a U.S. Open semifinalist.
"I come here and my goal was to get into the second or third round," Kerber said. "Now I'm in the semifinal. Yeah, it's [an] unbelievable feeling.
"I wake up last night and I was thinking, it's a dream or it's real? I mean, also the quarters was for me the best highlight of my career, and now I'm in the semis. Yeah, it's unbelievable."
Kerber, who had earned $156,887 in prize money this year going into the Open, will walk away with at least $450,000 for making the semifinals, with a bigger payday if she can knock off Stosur on Saturday.
