Mar 21, 2008, 0:16 GMT
Indian Wells, California - Jelena Jankovic lined on an all- Serbian semi-final with Ana Ivanovic by defeating Lindsay Davenport as the veteran quit with illness trailing 6-2 on Thursday at the Indian Wells Masters.
Davenport, a 31-year-old mother-of-one, packed in the contest in desert heat after losing the opening set in a brief 24 minutes.
Jankovic will next face Ivanovic after the emotion-prone top seed kept her psyche in perfect balance on the way to a quick 6-1, 6-4 victory over Russian Vera Zvonareva.
Emerging Serbia placed its third player into the business end of the event as Novak Djokovic struggled in the opening set for 73 minutes on his way to beating Swiss player Stanislas Wawrinka 7-6 (7- 2), 6-2.
Wawrinka, a frequent practice partner of Roger Federer, broke third-seed Djokovic as the seed served for the opening set at 5-3.
But a break-back in the 12th game took it into a tiebreaker, where Djokovic prevailed to establish the momentum that eventually carried him to victory in just over two hours.
He will play either Rafael Nadal in a repeat of last year's final won by the Spaniard, or American James Blake.
Ivanovic, who lost the Australian Open final to Maria Sharapova, moved through with ease over the 12th-seeded Russian. Ivanovic produced 18 winners and converted on four of a dozen break point chances.
She improved to 14-3 on the season and takes a 5-1 lead into her contest with Jankovic.
Ivanovic said that her clinical approach paid winning dividends in what she called her best match to date in the desert.
'I played some of my best tennis since coming here,' said the Swiss-based Serb, a finalist at the French and Australian Opens. 'I was really happy about that.'
The seed won the first four games against Zvonareva in 10 minutes but got into trouble in the second.
'In the second set I was up a break and lost a bit of concentration. I started to get a a little bit more, you know, emotional and trying to go for too much and lost my rhythm a little bit,' she said.
'But at the end of the second set I managed to keep calm and play good.'
Ivanovic faces a battle against her compatriot. 'It doesn't get easier from here, only gets tougher every match.
'It's going to be very interesting match against Jelena. We've played many times before and we always had close matches and very good ones.'
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