Wednesday 12th August 2009
Venus makes easy progress
Venus Williams made easy progress into the third round of the Western & Southern Financial Group Women's Open.
The world number three, who was a losing finalist last time out at the Bank of the West Classic at Stanford in California, had no problems against Olga Govortsova as she came through comfortably 6-2 6-2.
World number one and top seed Dinara Safina came through her match against Roberta Vinci of Italy 2-6 7-5 6-4, but fellow Russian and 10th seed Nadia Petrova was not so lucky.
Petrova, ranked 10th in the world, lost in straight sets to Alona Bondarenko of Ukraine 6-2 6-3.
Sixth seed Svetlana Kuznetsova was given a tough test by Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic but eventually emerged victorious 6-3 6-7 (2/7) 7-6 (7/4) in a match which lasted two hours and 18 minutes.
Thirteenth seed Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland made short work of Japan's Ai Sugiyama, prevailing 6-2 6-1 and Flavia Pennetta, 14th seed in Ohio and winner of the tour event in Los Angeles at the weekend, overcame Japanese qualifier Ayumi Morita 6-2 6-3.
Fifteenth seed Dominika Cibulkova tumbled out in the first round to Peng Shuai 6-2 6-1 while Agnes Szavay and Alisa Kleybanova are both through to the second round thanks to victories over Urszula Radwanska and Aravane Rezai.
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