The last time they met, Lisicki picked up her first win over Williams on her favoured grass in the fourth round of Wimbledon 2013. Ousting the defending champion was the start of a dream journey for Lisicki that ended in the Wimbledon finals, but the pair had not crossed each other since.
It looked as though Williams, who has been dominant this week in Miami, was on another roll, breaking for a 3-1 lead. Lisicki has been on an impressive run, first making a run to the semi-finals of Indian Wells after a very lacklustre start to the year with just one win behind her. That fighting spirit came to the fore as Lisicki broke back straight away, before nudging ahead but she could not keep hold of her advantage as Williams broke to force a tie-break.
Williams steadied the ship enough to take the first set, and queried the enthusiastic support from Lisicki’s coach while the German took her customary break after losing a set. The break seemed to do Lisicki good as she won six games on the bounce to take the match into a decider.
Williams had to come from 15-30 down in the first game to surge ahead once more, taking the first three games and after that closing out her 7-6(4) 1-6 6-3 700th landmark win, but had to admit that this had not been one of her more momentous days, especially where her serving and one poor unfortunate racquet were concerned.
"I wasn't playing my best today," Williams said. "But some days you're just off, and that's when you have to fight. Even if I lost today, if I just gave 100% then I wouldn't have been upset."
Of course this milestone could not go without some kind of celebration and a cake was brought out for her, as she came to realise what the win actually meant.
She said: "I had no idea. I saw them bringing out a cake and I thought, 'Whose birthday is it today?' But I really had no idea about it, so I'm really excited right now!"
Williams is now on a 19 match winning streak, with her last loss coming at the end of last year, when she was beat by Simona Halep in the round robin stages of the WTA Finals. She is on a 16 match winning streak in Miami, last losing to Caroline Wozniacki in the 2012 quarter-finals. Halep will play in the last quarter-final on Wednesday with the semi-finals being played on Thursday.
Extract from live-tennis
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