I watched the whole match last night. What did I see? Li hit the ball right in the middle of the court again and again with lots of power. She fired only very few cross court shots (and mostly went out). Obviously the game plan was "to overpower Dementieva". It did not work. Dementieva simply used her power to block back the ball until Li hit the ball into the net or out of the court. Li was 0:4 behind to start the match. I thought she would begin to somehow change the strategy. She did not. Maybe she just doesnt have a diverse repertoire. What really amazed me was that Li tried so many times to attack Dementieva's first serve without success, in the mean while she simply forgot Dementieva's second serve. Her second serve is the weakest among the top 20 players! But last night she won over 75% of her second serve agaist Li, compared with about 45% before the fourth round. Isn't that astonishing?

Obviously Li has worked very very hard to get this far. But tennis is a game that requires more than just muscle. Unfortunately Li Na does not have much more than that. Worse, she does not have a good coach to turn to.