Tennis:Seeded pair head for final

By Terry Maddaford

Anne Kremer and Cara Black go into today's ASB Bank Classic tennis semifinals as warm favourites to win through to the final.

As the only two seeded players in the last four, Kremer (Luxembourg) and Zimbabwe's Black should be too strong for American Meghann Shaughnessy and Amanda Hopmans (Netherlands) respectively.

Kremer had to battle all the way to beat unseeded Paola Suarez (Argentina), dropping her first set of the tournament along the way in one of yesterday's quarter-finals.

Black saw off top seed Elena Likhovtseva while Shaughnessy had very few problems in beating a lethargic Anna Smashnova 6-4 6-2.

Hopmans needed just over two hours and treatment for a foot injury in the second set before beating a spirited Miroslava Vavrinec (Switzerland) 7-6 (8-6) 6-2.