Australian Open Day Nine round-up: Novak Djokovic battles past Alexander Zverev to reach semi-finals, while Grigor Dimitrov crashes out to qualifier Aslan Karatsev

Novak Djokovic looked close to full fitness as he recovered from a set down against Alexander Zverev to win 6-7 (6-8), 6-2, 6-4, 7-6 (8-6) on Rod Laver Arena.

Despite suffering from an abdominal injury in the third round of the tournament, Djokovic prevailed to reach his ninth semi-final in Melbourne after three-and-a-half hours on court.

Despite the victory the Serbian claimed the injury was still troubling him in the first set: ‘With this kind of condition I need time to warm up, even though I had an hour of hitting practice before the match I still felt like it would take me time to feel that I can rotate well.

‘I have never had an injury that has been as difficult as this to recover from during a Grand Slam but I can only thank the magic hands of my physios, medical team and everyone who has spent their time to help me out to try and put me in a condition to play.

‘I started moving better and playing better after the first set and served extremely well. However in every set apart from the second I started poorly so I am really glad to overcome this kind of challenge.’

The world No 1 will continue his quest for an unprecedented ninth Australian Open title against the qualifier Aslan Karatsev, after the Russian became the first-ever player to reach a Grand Slam semi-final on their slam debut.

The world No 114 also recovered from a set down to defeat an injured Grigor Dimitrov in four sets in their quarter-final clash.

Meanwhile in the women’s draw, Serena Williams reached her 40th Grand Slam semi-final with a convincing straight-set victory over the world No 2 Simona Halep.

She will come up against the 2019 Australian Open champion Naomi Osaka in a blockbuster match-up after the Japanese defeated the world No 71 Hsieh Su-wei 6-2, 6-2 in just one hour and six minutes on court.

Elsewhere it was a successful day for the British players competing in the doubles.

Joe Salisbury and his American partner Desirae Krawczyk progressed in straight sets, as did Britain’s Neal Skupski winning in a champions tiebreak with his partner Andreja Klepac to set up a quarter-final match between the two pairs.

Britain also claimed silverware through the men’s wheelchair doubles partnership of Alfie Hewett and Gordan Reid.

The reigning champions retained their title with a straight-set victory in the final to claim a British record-equalling 10th Grand Slam title as a pair- winning their fifth consecutive grand slam in the process.