Japan's Naomi Osaka booked her place in the BNP Paribas Open final in emphatic fashion Friday night, powering past world No. 1 Simona Halep 6-3, 6-0 in the semis.The hard-hitting 20-year-old showed supreme confidence, wrapping up the match in 64 minutes and avenging her loss to Halep in the fourth round at January's Australian Open. Osaka became the first Japanese woman to beat a world No. 1 since Kimiko Date defeated Germany's Steffi Graf in a 1996 Fed Cup match.Osaka started on a strong note, opening the match with an ace after Halep won the coin toss and elected to test the world No. 44'…READ FULL ARTICLE
