Australia’s Samantha Stosur reached the WTA Tournament of Champions semi-finals on Friday with a 6-1 6-4 win over Bulgarian wildcard Tsvetana Pironkova.

Fourth-seeded Stosur will face Russia’s Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova for a place in the final, while Saturday’s other semi-final will feature former world No.1 Ana Ivanovic against in-form Romanian Simona Halep, who has five titles to her name this year.

Pavlyuchenkova, seeded sixth, accounted for French No.7 seed Alize Cornet 6-2 6-2.

Ivanovic, the world No.16 and second seed, made it to the last four despite losing her last group match 6-4 3-6 7-6 (7-1) to Russia’s No.5 seed Elena Vesnina.

Ivanovic, a French Open winner, had led 5-2 in the final set.

The 22-year-old Halep made the semi-finals by winning all three group matches without conceding a set and dropping just 16 games.