The semifinals of the Family Circle Cup women's tennis tournament get underway Saturday with Belgium's Justine Henin-Hardenne continuing her comeback from illness and injury.
Henin-Hardenne made the final four when world number one Lindsay Davenport of the United States withdrew from their quarterfinal with a hip injury. Henin-Hardenne spent most of last year on the sidelines with a viral infection and also had knee surgery.
The Belgian player takes on Tatiana Golovin of France, who knocked defending champion Venus Williams out of the clay-court tournament earlier this week.
The other semifinal has Switzerland's Patty Schnyder taking on Russian Elena Dementieva.
This event is one of several tournaments players are using to prepare for the second major tournament of the year, the French Open, which gets underway May 23 in Paris.
Meanwhile, defending champion Guillermo Coria of Argentina and Rafael Nadal of Spain have advanced to the finals of the Monte Carlo Masters Series tennis tournament.
Coria, the sixth seed, overcame a love-four (0-4) deficit in the second set to beat two-time champion Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain, 6-2, 7-5. The match had to be moved to a special indoor court because of persistent rain in Monaco.
Later, Spanish teenager Rafael Nadal defeated another teenage player, Richard Gasquet of France, in three sets 6-7, 6-4, 6-3. Gasquet beat world number one Roger Federer of Switzerland earlier in the tournament.
Coria and Nadal have met only once before - at this tournament two years ago - with Coria winning the match in straight sets (7-6, 6-2). Nadal has the better record this year with two tournament victories so far while Coria's best finish was a quarterfinal loss in Auckland, New Zealand in January.
Some informaiton for this report provided by Reuters.
