Harare — CARA Black and Liezel Huber are on the verge of winning their second women's tennis doubles title of the year after reaching the final of the Medibank Sydney International tournament in Australia yesterday.

According to reports from Sydney, the top-seeded pair of co-world number ones Black of Zimbabwe and American Huber beat Americans Laura Granville and Abigail Spears 6-1, 6-1 in the semi-finals of the US$600 000 tournament.

Granville and Spears were unseeded.

In today's final, Black and Huber will face the Italian-Russian pairing of Tathiana Garbin and Nadia Petrova.

To reach the final, Garbin and Petrova, who are unseeed, upset the fourth-seeded pair of Anna-Lena Groenefeld of Germany and American Vania King 6-3, 7-5 in the other semi-final tie yesterday.

But it was the manner in which top seeds Black and Huber disposed of their semi-final opponents Granville and Spears that sent a chilling message that they were hungry to lift their second title on the trot this year.

They were just all over their opponents who they sent packing in less than an hour.

Black and Huber are currently on fire.

Fresh from winning the ASB Classic doubles title in Auckland, New Zealand, last Saturday, Black and Huber kept the fire burning in Sydney where they dropped only one set en-route to today's final.

They first defeated in the first round on Monday the all-Russian team of Dinara Safina and Maria Kirilenko 6-2, 6-3 and in the quarter-finals on Wednesday stopped the Australian-Russian pairing of Anastasia Rodionova and Vera Dushevina 6-3, 4-6, 10-8.

The match had to be stopped at 4-3 in the third and final set with Black and Huber leading due to rain and was only resumed one-and-a-half-hour later.

Yesterday, the world's best women's doubles team met in the semi-finals Huber's compatriots Spears and Granville and they sent them to the cleaners without raising much of a sweat.

And if Black and Huber beat Garbin and Petrova in today's final, they will receive a winners' cheque for US$31 000.

They will add it to the US$11 000 that they won for clinching the doubles title at the ASB Classic in Auckland last Saturday.

If Black and Huber lose to Garbin and Petrova in today's final in Sydney, they will receive US$16 500, which has been put on the table for the losing finalists.

After playing in today's final in Sydney, Black and Huber will fly to Melbourne for the first Grand Slam of the year -- the Australian Open -- which starts on Monday.

Black and Huber are once again the top seeds at the Australian Open, which is set to run from January 18 to 31.