Seles and Dementieva win through

Monica Seles will face an eager teenager in the semi-final of the WTA Chase Championships in New York.  

Russia's Elena Dementieva continued her giantkilling act at Madison Square Garden when she followed up her first-round victory over defending champion Lindsay Davenport with a thrilling 6-4 2-6 6-4 triumph over fellow teenager Kim Clijsters of Belgium.

Seles claimed her place in the last four for the first time since 1992 when she defeated South Africa's Amanda Coetzer 6-3 6-4.

The number three seed needed just over an hour to put away Coetzer and improve her record to 9-1 lifetime against the diminutive South African.

"I'm just very happy," said Seles, who is competing in her first event after battling tendinitis in both feet for the last six weeks.

"I think the trainers have helped tremendously and I keep doing my exercises. As long as that keeps happening, hopefully I will just keep going like the last couple of days," she added.

Seles, who missed last year's event with a foot injury, may be competing in her last WTA championship as it moves next year to Germany, the country where she was stabbed during a match in 1993.

"Obviously, that's one of the reasons I decided to play with this little preparation," Seles said. "I just don't feel comfortable going back there and playing again."

In the match featuring two future stars of women's tennis, Dementieva and Clijsters provided the crowd of more than 13,000 with hard-hitting baseline tennis.

Dementieva said: "I really thought I was going to lose in the third set. Maybe she started to feel she could beat me and started making mistakes.

"I've always dreamed about playing against Monica. I learned to play tennis by watching her play against Steffi Graf."