L16: (7) Katie O'Brien WR 221 beat Ryoko Fuda (JPN) WR 287 (CH 143 in 2006) 7-6(3) 3-6 6-2
L16: Emily Webley-Smith WR 316 beat Akiko Yonemura (JPN) WR 338 (CH 208 in 2008) 2-6 6-1 6-3

QF: (7) Katie O'Brien WR 221 v Sachie Ishizu (JPN) WR 299 (JWR 5 in Jul 2010)
QF: Emily Webley-Smith WR 316 v Saisai Zheng (CHN) WR 327 (JWR 10)

-- Edited by wolf on Thursday 28th of April 2011 08:48:13 AM

Two nice wins to read about 

Emily's win takes her back to the verge of the top 300, which is a great effort. and another win would make sure she was back in. Katie's win avoids Cav who hasn't played at all this year making a temporary return to GB No 4.  

Katie is one of only two surviving seeds, the other remaining one is the no 3 seed who is in Katie's half of the draw.

Their two QF opponents took out two of the seeds. Ishizu took out the no 1 seed Namigata (JPN) WR 111  6 - 2  6 - 2 in R2 and Zheng took out the no 8 seed in R1. 

-- Edited by indiana on Thursday 28th of April 2011 11:45:27 AM

steven wrote:

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Hopefully Zheng isn't in quite as god form as when she thrashed Emily 0 & 2 at Muzaffarnagar in January!

-- Edited by steven on Thursday 28th of April 2011 12:12:46 PM

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Heavens, hope Zheng isn't in that form   

-- Edited by indiana on Thursday 28th of April 2011 02:17:04 PM

Emmers won, first 50K semi final for her. Good going!

Sounds like it was an old school match:

"Won 2+4,battle of who cld get to net 1st,similar styles.servevolleyd 2nd serve matchpt,cheeky!1st ever semi of 50 4me+played v well-excited!"

Great stuff by Emily, thoroughly getting revenge for that big defeat to Zheng on Indian grass in January.  Pity Katie couldn't make it two semi finalists.

Emily  now makes 7 Brits in the 200s in the rankings, behind the "big 3".  And although still GB No 10, one more win here and she will overtake Lisa, Naomi B and Mel and be level on points with Laura who is currently sitting provisionally GB No 6 on 198 ranking points ( Mel and Naomi are on 196 so all very tight there ).  As it is she is already clear no 4 in points won this year.

Her CH of 262 dates back to June 2005 and it will be tremendous if she can beat that in the near future, which does now look very possible.  If she doesn't do it here ( which she would if she won the title ) after this she has nothing to defend until June and only 6 points to come off before the start of August.

-- Edited by indiana on Friday 29th of April 2011 01:45:15 PM

What a great way to get revenge for that drubbing in January - that's her first 50K SF (it was only her second 50K QF), so no wonder she seems quite excited

"Won 2+4,battle of who cld get to net 1st,similar styles.servevolleyd 2nd serve matchpt,cheeky!1st ever semi of 50 4me+played v well-excited!"

On the face of it, playing Ogi gives her a great chance of reaching the Final, but the Japanese qualifier did beat former top 20 player Tanasugarn (even now ranked as high as 131) in R2.