Venue: Melbourne Park Date: 19 January-1 February
Coverage: BBC Red Button, Radio 5 Live sports extra, BBC Sport website (Red Button coverage streamed on website throughout fortnight)
 Verdasco showed pace, power and control to defeat Tsonga
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Fourteenth seed Fernando Verdasco won a battle of baseline power against fifth seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga to reach the Australian Open semi-finals.
The tenacious Verdasco, appearing in his first major quarter-final, fought to a 7-6 (7-2) 3-6 6-3 6-2 victory.
The 25-year-old Spaniard, who knocked out Britain's Andy Murray in the previous round, will now face either top seed Rafael Nadal or Gilles Simon.
Nadal will later meet sixth seed Simon in Wednesday's other quarter-final.
A tight first set between French star Tsonga and Verdasco, packed with ferocious, powerful tennis, rapidly moved to a tie-break as neither player's serve dropped.
Tsonga's serve looked weak early in the set but soon settled, while Verdasco rescued all four break points he offered with booming, outswinging serves for which the Frenchman had no answer.
Though Tsonga continued to examine his racquet strings and butt quizzically, he and Verdasco appeared an almost perfect match for each other underneath the roof of Rod Laver Arena.
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606: DEBATE
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Verdasco, who held two games to love in the first set, reproduced his fine, wide serve to earn four set points and converted at the first opportunity.
The Spaniard, ranked eight places below 23-year-old Tsonga in the world, continued to prove a tenacious, nimble and responsive opponent as the Frenchman sought a way back in the second set.
Tsonga generated early break points and, though he failed to take them, his serve remained devastatingly effective as he fired down his first love game of the match.
It took until the sixth game of the second set for either man's serve to fall. Verdasco attacked what looked an easy volley with too much power, sending it wide to hand Tsonga the break and, ultimately, the second set.
However, the previously impenetrable Tsonga serve collapsed early in the third.
Verdasco was still sprightly and energetic around the court with the roof blocking the heat, and he seized his opportunity, twice breaking serve to open up a 4-0 lead.
Verdasco immediately surrendered some of that advantage - Tsonga producing a ferocious cross-court passing shot to break back then holding serve with an eighth ace - but bravely held the seventh game under more pressure from the newly-invigorated fifth seed, and clung on to win the set.
When the 14th seed broke once more at the start of the fifth set, it looked difficult to see how Tsonga, fast running out of options other than his powerful but wayward baseline play, could recover.
Verdasco's wicked first serve survived one last, desperate test from Tsonga, and the Spaniard converted his fourth of four break points before serving an ace to seal the win.
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