American second seed Lindsay Davenport downed teenage sensation Venus Williams 1-6, 7-5, 6-3, in the quarter-finals of the Australian Open in the early hours of this morning.
Williams, runner-up to Martina Hingis at the 1997 US Open, looked set for another grand slam final after tearing past Davenport 6-1 in a first set lasting 17 minutes.
Davenport was beaten by Williams's younger sister, Serena, at the Sydney International tournament 10 days ago and appeared to have no reply to the 17-year-old's pounding groundstrokes.
But Williams took 20 minutes to win her first game in the second set, squandering successive break points as Davenport fought back into the match.
In the third set, both players again saw their service broken but Davenport was the more consistent and increasinly dominated at the net. Davenport (21) was also a semi-finalist at the US Open but has never won a grand slam title. She now meets eighth seed Conchita Martinez of Spain or ninth seed Sandrine Testud of France.
