SHENZHEN • When Karolina Pliskova plays like she did in yesterday's first set against Simona Halep in their WTA Finals Purple Group match, she is pretty much unstoppable.
The world No. 2 needed just 20 minutes to win 6-0, using her powerful groundstrokes to pummel the Wimbledon champion at the Shenzhen Bay Sports Centre.
She hit 11 winners and made three unforced errors, two of which were double faults.
Her levels dropped in the second set but the Czech ultimately prevailed 6-0, 2-6, 6-4, although she still trails 7-4 in the duo's head-to-head count. Her reward is a semi-final today against Australian world No. 1 Ashleigh Barty.
While Pliskova's first serve in the second set was a healthy 77 per cent, her unforced error count jumped from three in the previous set to 15. Halep carved out five break-point opportunities and converted three to force the decider.
The Romanian, who was runner-up in 2014, seemed to have all the momentum as she opened the third set by breaking Pliskova and racing to a 2-0 lead. That meant she had won six games in a row.
But the Czech regrouped impressively, winning the next five games before closing out the match to reach her third straight semi-final of the season finale.
In the earlier match, defending champion Elina Svitolina maintained her 100 per cent record with a hard-fought win over American alternate Sofia Kenin.
The Ukrainian, who was already assured of a semi-final spot, needed a whopping six match points before winning 7-5, 7-6 (12-10) in 2hr 10min. "I'm very, very happy that I finished the match in two sets," she said. "It was a very physical match and I had to stay very tough."
Kenin, 20, had a chance to serve out in each set but faltered at the crucial points. She had replaced injured Canadian Bianca Andreescu on Thursday and had no chance of progressing to the last four.
Svitolina, who earned straight-set wins over Halep and Pliskova, is on a nine-match winning streak at the event.
She faces Swiss seventh seed Belinda Bencic in the other last-four clash today and said: "It's gonna be another tough match."
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
