SYDNEY — A violent thunderstorm and persistent rain prevented any of the scheduled singles tennis matches from being completed on women's semi-final and men's quarter-finals day at the Sydney International on Thursday.
Simona Halep, the second seed for next week's Australian Open, was one of a string of top players whose hopes of getting a good workout before the year's opening grand slam were stymied by the weather.
The Romanian top seed was leading 5-4 in the opening set of her semi-final encounter with one of her predecessors as world number two, Svetlana Kuznetsova, when the rain stopped played for the second and final time for the day.