Serena Williams of US hits a return to Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark during their semi-final of the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour Championships in Doha yesterday.

BY C APRAMEYA

DOHA: Serena Williams and her elder sister Venus will battle for supremacy in the final of the Sony Ericsson Championships here at the Khalifa International Tennis and Squash Complex today.

The Williams sisters took contrasting routes to the summit clash yesterday. The world number one Serena, who is the lone player in the field to have remained unbeaten so far, won her semi-final against Denmark’s Caroline Wozniacki 6-4, 0-1 when the latter retired with a stomach injury.

In what was a repeat of last year’s semi-final in the other match, Venus defeated Jelena Jankovic of Serbia 5-7, 6-3, 6-4.

The Championships have been littered with injuries starting from top seed Russian Dinara Safina (lower back). Safina’s replacement, another Russian Vera Zvonareva also pulled out after just one game due to an ankle injury. Victoria Azarenka too suffered same fate against Agnieszka Radwanska.

The 19-year-old Wozniacki, who had struggled with left thigh injury in her victory over Zvonareva on Thursday, finally gave up in the knockout stage. The world number four had come through in two three-set matches.

Serena and Venus have met in 10 finals with the former holding the advantage having won seven of those including the Wimbledon final this year. In Grand Slam finals too Serena is ahead at 6-2. Overall also the younger sibling has advantage at 12-10 (including her round robin win here).

The duo of Jankovic-Venus had not met since that three-set semi-final affair here in Doha in the previous Sony Ericsson Championships and the result turned out to be the same in two hours and 34 minutes. Their career head-to-head record stands at 5-5.

Venus, who is the defending champion, dropped the first set before rallying past her Serbian opponent. Venus is the first player to reach the final of this showpiece event despite losing two matches in the round robin stage since France’s Amelie Mauresmo in 2003.

In what were humid conditions, the American seventh seed had to bring all her experience to reach her second successive Sony Ericsson Championships final.

Venus struggled with unforced errors in the first set as Jankovic clinched the set at 7-5. In the second, Jankovic failed to convert three break points at 2-2 allowing Venus to bounce back and take the set 6-3.

In the decider, both players found it hard to hold serves. Venus broke Jankovic’s serve thrice in the set and served out the match at 5-4. For the world number eight Jankovic, it was heartbreak yet again failing to clear the last-four hurdle for the second time. The 29-year-old Venus, just like Jankovic, had not started off well in Doha. She lost both her opening round robin matches before sneaking into the semi-finals with just one win over Svetlana Kuznetsova. For Jankovic, it has not been a good 2009 after ending last year as world’s top ranked player. She managed to take the eighth and last spot for this Season-Ending event.

“If I want to win (I have to play better).  If I don’t, then I won’t. And obviously I want to win. So I’m going to have to really, really improve my game,” felt Serena when asked about playing Venus in today’s final.

Venus said that she wanted to end the year by reaching the final and she was excited to be there.

“Yes, it’s wonderful (to be in the final). I am so excited. It’s the way I wanted to end the year,” she said.

“Yeah, I came so close to winning my first two round robin matches.  In my last match in the round robin, I was just determined to not have 0-3. That was really what it was about. You know, winning a set in every match I played, at least one set, really kept my dream alive,” Venus, the world number seven said talking about her round robin stage.

Jankovic said: “It is disappointing (to lose). I had so many chances. Especially I won that first set, then I had a lot of breakpoints in the second set, then I let everything slip away. Then she took that second set. Again, the third I had a lot of breakpoints.”

Wozniacki said that she could not continue playing as the pain was affecting her serve. “I was feeling pain in my stomach muscle and my abdominal muscle.  Like yesterday, I had problems serving. But today after a while, it went over, and also when I was hitting my shots, just regular groundstrokes, I started feeling it. So, it was just too much for me to keep playing,” the Dane said after impressing on debut. The final will start at 6.00 pm.