Thursday, September 10, 2009 NEW YORK: Roger Federer will play Novak Djokovic in the US Open semi-finals on Saturday, their third consecutive clash at Flushing Meadows after the final of 2007 and the semi-finals of last year. Top seed and defending champion Federer reached the last four for a record 22nd time in a Grand Slam tournament despite a stirring late show from Robin Soderling, winning 6-0, 6-3, 6-7 (6/8), 7-6 (8/6). Fourth-seeded Djokovic won a dour, stamina-sapping encounter with Spain's Fernando Verdasco 7-6 (7/2), 1-6, 7-5, 6-2 to reach the semi-finals for the third consecutive year. Teen upstarts Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark and Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium fought through the tension to reach their first Grand Slam semi-finals with nerve-testing US Open triumphs. Ninth seed Wozniacki, until now the top-ranked woman never in a Slam final eight, ousted 70th-ranked US teen Melanie Oudin 6-2, 6-2 while Wickmayer, never before past a Slam second round, beat Ukraine's Kateryna Bondarenko 7-5, 6-4. Oudin, 17, was the giant killer of Flushing meadows, ousting former world number one Maria Sharapova, fourth seed Elena Dementieva and 13th seed Nadia Petrova after dumping former world number one Jelena Jankovic at Wimbledon.
Friday, August 14, 2009 MUMBAI: A 26-year-old woman died Thursday of H1N1 swine flu in the southern city of Bangalore, raising India's death toll from the virus to 20, authorities said.The death was the first reported in India's information technology capital, the Press Trust of India reported.Meanwhile in Pune, the worst-affected in India, two more victims of the virus died Thursday, raising the death toll in that western city near Mumbai to 12, the report said. The victims were an 11-month-old boy and a 75-year-old old woman.US media reported movie halls, schools and colleges were ordered closed Thursday for three days to a week in Mumbai, the commercial and financial capital of the country, as fear of the pandemic spread.Prajakata Lavangare, a spokeswoman for the government of Maharashtra state of which Mumbai is the capital, said similar orders were issued in Pune, which is also located in the state.The woman who died in Bangalore was identified only as Roopa, a teacher in...
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