Black Tennis Pros

Venus Williams ended a spirited challenge from Danish teen Caroline Wozniacki on Friday to reach the final of the Japan Open tennis tournament.

The Wimbledon champion, powered her way to a 6-3, 7-5 victory to move to within one match of back-to-back tour wins after last week's Korea Open triumph.

In Saturday's final Venus will take on fifth seed Virginie Razzano of France, who defeated eighth seed Flavia Pennetta of Italy 4-6, 7-5, 6-3.

"It feels good. It's great to be in the finals," Williams said.

"I was like, 'can I do this? Is it possible?' But it is, so it's exciting."

After losing the first four games in a row and eventually the first set, Wozniacki went ahead 2-0 in the second set and then 4-2, taking advantage of Williams's two double faults in the sixth game.

But Venus steadied herself to make it 5-5 -- thanks to a questionable line-call -- before winning the last three games to finish off the 97-minute match.

"Four-two is definitely not the set, it's just one break, so winning one game is always pretty much even," said Williams.

"I was trying to win one game at one time. I was very confident. I was trying to focus on making less errors," she said.

The 17-year-old Wozniacki said she could not cope with Williams once the Wimbledon champion returned to form in the second set.

"Venus played really well, she just smashed winners in the corners, so I couldn't do anything," she said.

"I was trying to keep my tactics, just tried to make her run, but at 4-2 she really raised her game until four-all and she just did a lot of winners, so I couldn't really do anything.

"It's tough to break her serve even though I broke her serve three times in the match," said Wozniacki.