Maria Sharapova breezed past Iveta Benesova of the Czech Republic at the Pan Pacific Open yesterday to stay on course for a potential final showdown against Jelena Jankovic.
The Russian former world No. 1 shrugged off a service break deficit in each set before scoring a 6-4, 7-5 victory to advance.
Sharapova, who lost the opening game after a double fault, hit an easy forehand winner at the net to make it 4-4 in the eighth before taking the following two games and the set.
PHOTO: AFP
The 22-year-old struggled with her serve in the second set, relying instead on a number of sizzling winners from Benesova’s second serve.
Seventh seed Serb Jankovic, another former world No. 1, powered her way through to a 6-4, 6-3 victory over Marion Bartoli, putting an end to her match-losing streak against the French 14th seed.
Fifteenth seed Li Na earned a 7-6 (9/7), 4-6, 7-6 (7/4) victory over Victoria Azarenka of Belarus to earn a match against Jankovic while 11th seed Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland whipped Magdalena Rybarikova of Slovakia 6-3, 6-1 and plays Sharapova next.
■SIMON BEATS KEVIN KIM
AFP, BANGKOK
Gilles Simon of France tested his chronic sore knee with a 6-2, 6-2 defeat of American Kevin Kim while retiring Russian Marat Safin ticked up another tournament loss yesterday as he winds down his career at the Thailand Open.
Simon said that he remains concerned about his problem knee.
“I really need a lot of recovery after my matches. It’s a lot of icing and rest. Everything depends on my knee,” he said.
Swiss qualifier Marco Chiudinelli ended Safin’s run with a 6-3, 7-6 (7/4) win.
“I’m a little disappointed. It should have gone the other way,” said the Russian, who will end his career at the Paris Masters next month.
“I may be retiring, but I still want to win. I don’t want to give away any matches. I really hate to lose,” Safin said.
In other matches German Andreas Beck defeated Donald Young of the US, 6-1, 6-7 (3/7), 6-4 while eighth seed John Isner beat Germany’s Mischa Zverev 7-6 (7/5), 6-4.
■MONFILS, BERDYCH WIN
AFP, KUALA LUMPUR
Frenchman Gael Monfils beat Martin Vassallo Arguello 6-4, 6-2 at the Malaysia Open yesterday, setting up a quarter-final with top seed Nikolay Davydenko.
Czech sixth seed Tomas Berdych reached the last eight, but had to go the distance to overcome German Simon Greul 6-3, 4-6, 6-3 at the Putra stadium.
Berdych fired nine aces and saved the only two break points as he raced to post the win in just over two hours of battle.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier