Tennis: Erakovic semi suspended on knife edge

New Zealand's Marina Erakovic will have to wait another day to attempt to reach her maiden grand slam doubles final after her Wimbledon semifinal was suspended at 5-5 in the third set today.

Erakovic and her Thai partner Tamarine Tanasugarn were on the brink of exiting the tournament after trailing 5-2 in the third set against Sam Stosur of Australia and German partner Sabine Lisicki.

But they come back to make it 5-5 in the deciding set before the match which was stopped at 3-6, 6-4, 5-5 by the fading light at 9.30pm local time.

The match will resume tonight (NZT) where the winners will then play second seeds Kveta Peschke of Czech Republic and Katarina Srebotnik of Slovenia in the final later in the day.

The 23-year-old Kiwi is looking to become the first New Zealander to reach a final at Wimbledon since Chris Lewis made the 1983 men's final.

Stosur and Lisicki took control of the match early on after winning the first set in 32 minutes.

After going out to a 5-1 lead in the second set Erakovic and Tanasugarn squandered 10 set points, letting their opponents close the score to 5-4, before eventually winning the set 6-4.

The second set turned when the Kiwi/Thai duo played the majority of their shots towards a tiring Lisicki playing in her 12th match of the tournament after also reaching the singles semifinals.

Stosur and Lisicki looked to have the match wrapped up at 5-2 in the third but Erakovic and Tanasugarn broke twice to tie the match up.

Erakovic is ranked 112th in the world for doubles while her partner is ranked 108th.

- Herald online