Halep tops Errani to reach Rogers Cup final

There now came the wait to see who she would face as the second semifinal between Serena Williams and 18 year old Swiss Star Belinda Bencic would determine her fate.

Williams won in Toronto in her last two appearances in 2011 and 2013.

“I can’t describe the feeling right now”, said Bencic, the victor this year at Eastbourne for her first career title.

“I played her once on grass court”.

Halep served well, especially in the third set where she rallied from a 3-2 deficit. “So I was happy”.

Second seed Simona Halep recovered from a sluggish start to defeat Polish sixth seed Agnieszka Radwanska and book a semi-final showdown with Italy’s Sara Errani. “Her slice, I think I handled it really well tonight”. “I have to recover from today”.

In a week that already saw Bencic knock of the likes of Canada’s Eugenie Bouchard and former No. 1 players Caroline Wozniacki and Ana Ivanovic, this one clearly took the cake. “Sometimes you take power from the crowd and today (they) helped me a lot”. And I want more.

Williams barely broke sweat en route to a 5-1 lead in the opener, courtesy of two breaks of serve.

“I knew I had to win it, because at the end I was so exhausted I couldn’t move anymore”, Halep said.

A more than exuberant Bencic chimed in on her biggest win that propels the promising adolescent to the biggest match of her career, a Premier 5 title match with third-ranked Halep on Sunday. “And everything wasn’t right with it. My toss was off, and just struggling to try and get that normal lift off, but didn’t work out”.

The other day, after she played an excellent match to knock out Roberta Vinci, Williams coyly said: “Maybe I’m a little stressed out”.

Henin, indeed, is not very tall and when she was a teenager there were many people – coaches, agents, family members – who doubted she could be a very good professional player.

Halep’s earlier titles this season came in January at Shenzhen, February at Dubai and in March at Indian Wells. I’m working hard. Of course I won’t give up now – I’m just looking forward to the next tournaments. In 2013 Errani won their first meeting, but Halep has defeated her twice since then.

In the doubles quarterfinals, the top-seeded team of Martina Hingis of Switzerland and Sania Mirza of India beat Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Chan Yung-jan, 6-4, 6-2.