AUSTRALIAN OPEN
Venue: Melbourne Park Date: 18-31 January
BBC coverage: Every Murray match live on BBC 1 or 2
Daily from 0800 GMT: live on BBC Red Button/website, 5 Live sports extra
Daily from 0000 GMT: text commentary on BBC Sport website

Serena Williams is looking to defend the title she won last year

Defending champion Serena Williams staged a magnificent comeback to beat Victoria Azarenka and reach the semi-finals of the Australian Open.

The American was in serious trouble at a set and 4-0 down but stormed back to win 4-6 7-6 (7-4) 6-2.

There was disappointment earlier for the Williams family when Venus lost 2-6 7-6 (7-4) 7-5 to 16th seed Li Na.

China now has two players in the last four of a Grand Slam for the first time, with Jie Zheng already through.

Jie will take on former world number one Justine Henin of Belgium in the other semi-final.

Li, 27, had become China's first ever Grand Slam quarter-finalist at Wimbledon in 2006, but that feat had been surpassed when Jie reached the last four the All England Club two years ago.

I don't think it has anything to do with whether I was playing good Venus Williams

Li now faces top seed Serena Williams, who has won the title on each of the previous four occasions she has reached the semi-finals.

However, the 28-year-old American was given a huge scare by Azarenka.

At 4-0 down in the second set, Serena admitted: "I was actually thinking 'If I lose today and I lose in doubles I think I can catch a flight on Friday'. That's not what a champion is supposed to think, but that's what I was thinking.

"I'm just happy to still be here."

Having not broken in any of her previous four matches, Serena lost four of her opening seven service games as the seventh-seeded Belarussian engineered a commanding lead.

However, Serena's serve improved gradually and having recovered from 3-1 down to take the second set tie-break, the world number one eventually overpowered her 20-year-old opponent.

"I think I played good tennis today," said Azarenka, who also led Serena by one set last year before retiring with illness.

"It was very high level of tennis from both of us. I knew she would fight until the last point and she started playing unbelievable, I think, from 4-0. I mean, she was really in the zone at that point.

"I didn't change my game, she really went for her shots and she made them. I don't think I did many unforced errors, but it was her controlling some of the points."

Wednesday's first women's quarter-final saw a total of 110 unforced errors and was a low quality match for the most part, with Li in particular struggling for the best part of two sets.

But Venus was well below her best too and, after she failed to serve out the match at 5-3 in the second set, the seven-time Grand Slam champion paid the price.

Li edged a tight tie-break and proved marginally the stronger towards the end of a final set that included nine breaks of serve.

The Chinese player was broken to love when first serving for the match but she broke again and converted her second chance with a forehand down the line after two hours and 47 minutes.

"I don't think it has anything to do with whether I was playing good," said Venus. "I have to give her a lot of credit for playing well and picking her game up.

"In tennis you have to close it out. It's not like there's a clock ticking and then suddenly it's over. You just have to close it out. I didn't do that today."

Li's win is set to propel her into the world's top 10 for the first time.

"My goal this year was top 10. But now it's only January so it's come quickly," she said.

"I didn't think about that. I know the tournament is not finished. So (I'll) continue hopefully."

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