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Safina stuns Sharapova to earn quarter-final place

Dinara Safina sent top seed Maria Sharapova crashing out of the French Open on Monday to throw the Roland Garros title chase wide open.

Safina battled back from a set and 2-5 down, and also saved a match point, to see off her Russian compatriot 6-7 (6/8), 7-6 (7/5), 6-2 and reach the quarter-finals for the second time where she will meet countrywoman Elena Dementieva.

Monday’s victory was Safina’s third win in six career meetings against her fellow Russian and postponed, at least for another year, Sharapova’s dreams of winning the only Grand Slam title to have eluded her.

“I had many opportunities but I guess it was a combination of not taking those chances and being a little unlucky at times,” Sharapova said.

“Physically you have to stick with her. She’s had great success on clay and is a really tough opponent on this surface. It went in the wrong direction really fast. It was just one of those days,” she said.

Safina, the 13th seed, demonstrated her claycourt credentials last month when she won the lucrative Berlin tournament, beating Justine Henin, to send the former world No. 1 into retirement, Serena Williams and then Dementieva in the final.

“After my title in Berlin, this was one of my best matches and one of my best comebacks,” said Safina who saved a match point in the ninth game of the second set and was also 2/5 down in the tiebreaker which followed.

“I knew I could beat her but I put too much pressure on myself and was way too passive. I was too dependent on her and I was 2-5 down in the second set and facing a match point,” she said. “But I hit a winner on her match point and it changed things.”

In the men’s singles tournament top-ranked Roger Federer reached the quarter-finals for the 16th Grand Slam event in a row by beating Frenchman Julien Benneteau 6-4, 7-5, 7-5 on Monday.

Federer was broken serving for each of the first two sets but recovered to close them out. Steady rain prompted a 90-minute interruption before the third set.

“It was unfortunate I couldn’t serve it out the way I wanted to in the first and second set, but I felt OK out there,” Federer said. “It was tough conditions with the rain delay.”

His next opponent will be No. 24-seeded Fernando Gonzalez, who ended Robby Ginepri’s surprising run at Roland Garros, 7-6 (4), 6-3, 6-1. Ginepri was the last American in either singles draw.
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