Stosur stuns Serena, Melzer makes good against Djokovic at Roland Garros

And the upsets continued today at Roland Garros with Sam Stosur shocking top seed Serena Williams 6-2, 6-7 (2), 8-6 and saving a match point in the quarterfinals two days after knocking off 4-time champ Justine Henin. The Aussie served well, particularly with her kick serve out to ReRe's backhand on the ad side, and moved fluidly allowing her to drive those big forehands to all parts of the court. She hit 30 winners against 24 errors, 6 aces and won 58% of the points when she had to thrown down a second delivery.

She'll face Jelena Jankovic, who defeated Yaroslava Shvedova 7-5, 6-4, for a spot in Saturday's ladies' final.


The seventh seed was asked whether she felt it was her time to break through and win a major:

Q. Do you feel you can win the tournament here?

SAMANTHA STOSUR: Well, yeah. I mean, I think I've got as good a chance as anyone. I'm in the semis now; I played two great matches. Hopefully they're both gonna help me for tomorrow's match.

Q. You've obviously been able to fight it out not only against Justine, but now Serena. How's your belief right now?

SAMANTHA STOSUR: As good as it's ever been. Two great matches back to back for me, which is fantastic. Yeah, it's not over yet. Now I'm in the semis, and I want to definitely try and keep going. I made it to this point last year. If I can try and go another set further, then that would be great.

And what about ReRe's post-match comments? Well, in typical style she gave more credit to her supposed bad play than the Aussie's superior one. Go figure.

What a great moment for Sammie. I think the big question before the match was whether she would be able to come back after defeating Justine, who was the choice of many pundits and fans to take the whole thing, and not be emotionally spent or mentally shaky. I thought she might not be able take this match after being broken when serving for the match in the second set but she stayed calm and played within herself.

Clearly, if Sammie continues to play this brand of tennis she'll make it extremely tough for anyone to stop her.


An even bigger upset occurred when Jurgen Melzer and his wings, who never made it past the third round of any major, edged out 2-time semifinalist Novak Djokovic 3-6, 2-6, 6-2, 7-6(3), 6-4 in their quarterfinal match. The Austrian wasted two match points but made good on the third to win in 4 hours and 15 minutes. He'll face the ultimate test when he takes on Rafael Nadal, who beat compatriot Nicolas Almagro 7-6 (2), 7-6 (3), 6-4, for a spot in the men's final on Sunday.

Jurgen was typically drop shot happy but was steady balancing 59 winners against 59 errors and hitting 9 aces against 5 double faults. The same can't be said for the Serb who hit 53 winners/62 errors and 4 aces/10 double faults - a sloppy performance down the stretch for the third seed.

The pair shared a sweet MOMA moment at the net after the match:


It's exciting to see Jurgen make a real push here at the tender age of 29-years old. We've grown accustomed to seeing prodigies win the big ones in tennis but this time around the veterans like Jurgen and Francesca Schiavone are finally making waves. And it's about time.

[Photo(s): Getty Images]