Serena Williams produced a performance of sheer guts and will power to battle her way into the final with a 7-6(4) 6-1 victory over Shahar Peer of Israel in 1 hour and 26 minutes.
Williams fired 26 winners including 7 aces, but commited 33 unforced errors.
She took the closely contested opening set on the tiebreak with a service winner and a yell of "come on!" after dominating most of the rallies with her powerful drives that had the young Israeli scrambling deperatly from side to side.
With the first set under her belt, Williams dominated the second set as Peer began to tire. With two breaks of the Peer serve Williams found herself serving for the match at 5-1. She closed out the match with an ace up the T and a raised right arm in the air.
"I definately wasn't playing anywhere near my best tonight", Williams admitted. "But I'm glad I was able to come through because I know I can play a lot better than what I played tonight."
Her father who came on court as her coach after she won the first set gave her some timely advice.
"He said I was playing the crowd because she had a lot of people on her side. He said that I looked nervous. I remember him saying that, so it was like, just stay relaxed, don't play the crowd, play the game."
Looking ahead to the final, Williams is relishing the prospect of playing world number 1 Justine Henin for the first time since Wimbledon 2003 where she beat the Belgian in the semifinals.
"She's going to be playing really well; she probably watched my match tonight. We've had some tough matches in the past, so hopefully we'll just play a great, honest match." 

Andre Jones
Crandon Park
Key Biscayne

Post this story to:   del.icio.us  |   Digg  |   Newsvine  |   NowPublic  |   Reddit