Serena Williams "excited" to face Simona Halep again

Serena Williams has said that she is "excited" to play Simona Halep again in the WTA Championship final after suffering a heavy defeat to the Romanian earlier this week.

The world number one was thrashed 6-0 6-2 in the group stages in Singapore, but still managed to reach the final of the event, beating Caroline Wozniacki in the semi-finals this morning.

The American told BBC Sport: "I'm excited. My goal is to win three games. That'll be my first goal. I'm going to go from there. Hopefully I can hold serve. That would be good. Most of all, I hope to break once.

"Caroline played a great match, it was really difficult today. I feel so bad. She's the only one undefeated [after the group stages] in this tournament and she deserved to win."

Halep is appearing in the end-of-season event for the first time, while Williams has won the competition four times, including for the last two years.