Caroline-Elena showdown

World number two Caroline Wozniacki outclassed Victoria Azarenka of Belarus to take a berth in the final at the Pan Pacific Open women's tennis tournament on Friday.
The 20-year-old Danish top seed, who dropped only seven games in her three previous matches this week, needed a tough two hours and 51 minutes before clinching a 6-2, 6-7 (3/7), 6-4 victory in the semifinals.
"I'm feeling really good. I'm enjoying being here to play the final. It's a great feeling. I'm looking forward to that," said Wozniacki, who lost her opening matches in her previous two visits here.
"I was really happy that I won the match and that I was in the final. It was a tough match and Victoria is a great player and a good friend of mine. We always have tough matches and it was nice to win this battle."
In the final on Saturday, Wozniacki will play Beijing Olympic gold medallist Elena Dementieva of Russia, who defeated French Open champion Francesca Schiavone of Italy 6-4, 7-5.
Azarenka, playing her first tournament since her collapse in the US Open, got off to a good start, hitting a backhand winner down the line to take an advantage before breaking Wozniacki in the opening game.
But the Dane took the following four games in a row and won the set on Azarenka's sixth double fault in the eighth game.
Azarenka, 21, again broke to love in the first game of the second set and added two more breaks, but each time Wozniacki broke back, saving one set point in the 10th game to force a tie-breaker.
Azarenka again lost a mini-break up twice, but a couple of winners from the base line gave her a 5-3 lead and then forced the Dane to mis-fire her shots to tie the contest at one set all.
However, Azarenka seemed to run out of steam as she went down 0-5 in the final set. Although she crawled back to 4-5 taking 12 points in a row, Wozniacki calmly served out to finish off the two-hour-51-minute battle.
"At 5-0 I felt really good, then Victoria started playing really, really well and it was 5-4. I know that Victoria is a competitor, she doesn't give up, she didn't have anything to lose anymore," said Wozniacki.
"She could just go for her shots and everything was going in. I was 'OK, I'm up 5-4 and it's my serve and I have a break, so I just need to get my first serves in,'" she added.
Meanwhile, Azarenka said: "It was a good match for both of us. In the first set I was doing everything right. I couldn't take the opportunities when I had them, so that cost me a lot of games today."
"There were so many close games, especially in the first set, and I couldn't take the opportunities as well as the beginning of the third set," added the 11th-ranked Azarenka.