There will be a Swiss in the men’s final and an American in the women’s final following the completion of Tuesday’s top half men’s and women’s quarter-finals.
Kicking off play in the morning was 13th seed Venus Williams against Russia’s Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, who by reaching the quarter-finals of the Australian Open for the first time completed her set of having reached the last eight at each of the four Grand Slams.
In the first set, Pavlyuchenkova, the 2006 junior champion, broke in the third game for a 2-1 lead but would be broken back immediately; she would break later on for a 4-3 lead but Venus would win the next three games to take the opening set 6-4.
The Russian broke midway through the second set at 4-3 but could not consolidate the break, with Venus breaking back immediately after before forcing a tiebreak, which appeared to be evenly poised at 3-all.
However, upon the change of ends, a forehand winner from Venus would kick-start a run of three consecutive points, to the point where she gained as many match points at 6-3. A double-fault from Pavlyuchenkova would end the contest, sending the American to her first Australian Open semi-final since 2003.
That year, she went on to reach the final but would be beaten there by her younger sister Serena, who by winning her first (of six) Australian Open title would complete the Serena Slam at just 21 years of age.
In her first semi-final at Melbourne Park for 14 years, she will face compatriot Coco Vandweghe, who dismissed reigning French Open champion Garbine Muguruza with embarrassing ease in the second of the women’s quarter-finals.
After a lengthy seventh game, the American, who also reached the quarter-finals at Wimbledon in 2015, would break and from there would win eight of the final nine games of the match to advance to her first Grand Slam semi-final.
So dominant was the 25-year-old American that she did not face a break point until the tenth game of the opening set, when she was serving for it at 5-4, and then not again until she served for the match at 5-0 in the second.
She becomes the latest surprise semi-finalist at the Australian Open, following the breakthroughs of Johanna Konta (last year), Madison Keys (2015), Eugenie Bouchard (2014) and Sloane Stephens (2013) at this tournament in years past.
Vandeweghe will again start as the underdog in her semi-final against Venus Williams, who is in prime position to reach her first Grand Slam final since Wimbledon all the way back in 2009.
It is also the most recent time the Williams sisters have met in a major final, and the prospect of that happening will hinge on how Serena fares in her quarter-final against Great Britain’s Johanna Konta.
The last of the women’s quarter-finals will pose a tough test for both players, especially with Konta having won her last nine matches in straight sets and Serena looking to capitalise on top seed Angelique Kerber’s early exit by winning the title and returning to the top of the WTA rankings.
It will be the first time the pair have faced each other, and so both players will be keen to test each other’s strengths and try to exploit some weaknesses as both players bid for a semi-final berth.
The earlier quarter-final will pit fifth seed and title favourite Karolina Pliskova up against Croatia’s Mirjana Lucic-Baroni, who will be contesting her first Grand Slam quarter-final since Wimbledon in 1999.
Lucic-Baroni’s graduation to the final eight stage at Melbourne Park ends a run of 33 Grand Slam tournaments contested without getting past the fourth round dating back to that final four appearance at the All England Club.
In the intervention, she missed a lot of tennis during the noughties, citing personal and financial problems including continued abuse from her father, Marinko, before starting a mini-comeback earlier this decade.
She has now reached the quarter-finals of the Australian Open for the first time and if she can continue on her impressive run, which included defeating Agnieszka Radwanska in the second round, then her comeback will become one of the fairytale stories of this year’s tournament.
However, facing Pliskova will be no easy task at all, especially with the Czech serving machine having started 2017 in hot fashion, winning the Brisbane International in the first week of the new season.
In the men’s division, Stan Wawrinka and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga engaged in what was expected to be a tight tussle, with the opening set going to a tiebreak after neither opponent was able to break each other.
However the 2008 champion, would dominate it, winning it by 7-2.
By virtue of Wawrinka’s victory over Tsonga yesterday, Belgium’s David Goffin will make his top ten debut when the rankings are updated following the end of the tournament.
But first, he needs to get past Bulgaria’s Grigor Dimitrov, who took out Novak Djokovic’s second round conqueror, Denis Istomin, in the fourth round with a four-set victory.
That quarter-final will guarantee a first-time Australian Open semi-finalist, though Dimitrov did reach the semi-finals at Wimbledon in 2014.
The other will pit third seed Milos Raonic against 2009 champion Rafael Nadal, who has again proven that his best is still good enough to be a contender at the Grand Slam tournaments, given the injury woes he has endured in the past three years.
Raonic is the highest seed remaining in the men’s draw and though he did beat Nadal recently in the quarter-finals of the Brisbane International, the Canadian will start as underdog against the 14-times major champion.
If Nadal wins, it will keep alive the tantalising prospect of a first Federer versus Nadal Grand Slam final since the 2011 French Open, and first in Australia since that epic 2009 decider which was won by the Spaniard in five gruelling sets.
All is now set for what should be an exciting end to the 2017 Australian Open.
Matches to watch on Day 10
Rod Laver Arena
Day session (starts 11:00am)
[5] Karolina Pliskova (CZE) versus Mirjana Lucic-Baroni (CRO)
Not before 1:00pm
[9] Johanna Konta (GBR) versus [2] Serena Williams (USA)
[11] David Goffin (BEL) versus [15] Grigor Dimitrov (BUL)
Night session (starts 7:30pm)
[9] Rafael Nadal (ESP) versus [3] Milos Raonic (CAN)
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