Federer Reaches Quarterfinals, Venus Out of Roland Garros
Defending champion Roger Federer once again showed his class when he defeated his fellow Swiss Stanislas Wawrinka in straight sets. Top seed Federer showed no mercy in defeating his Olympic gold medal winning teammate with the score of 6-3, 7-6 and 6-2.
20th seed Wawrinka, who was part of the winning duo in the 2008 Beijing Olympics, was broken twice by Federer in the opening set of the match. After sealing the first set, Federer lost his serve in the opening game before breaking Wawrinka in the eighth game to level the scores. With the score level at 5-5 in the tie breaker, Wawrinka made a horrendous mistake when he netted a backhand volley despite the fact that Federer was out of position. Federer, however, on his serve sealed the set with a tie-breaker score of 7-5. Former Roland Garros junior champion Wawrinka was helpless against the top seed’s class when Federer once again established an easy lead in the third set. The third set ended with the score of 6-2, in an almost two hour match which saw Federer proceeding to the quarterfinals. This was Federer’s fifth career win against fellow Swiss Wawrinka in a total of six clashes. Federer will now face Swedish 5th seed Robin Soderling, who beat Croatian 10th seed Marin Cilic in straight sets (6-4, 6-4, 6-2). Keeping in view his recent form and his impeccable record against his compatriot, it is unlikely that Federer will face any hurdles in his quest to reach the last four.
Meanwhile, four-time Champion Rafael Nadal, who previously showed his fitness when he bulldozed pass former world No.1 Lleyton Hewitt with the score of 6-3, 6-4 and 6-3, continued his record of not having dropped any set in this year’s championship with a straight-set win over Thomaz Bellucci. The 24th seed lost to Nadal at Court Philippe Chatrier with a final score of 6-2, 7-5, 6-4.
On the other hand, World No. 2 Venus Williams was thrown out of the tournament by Russian 19th seed Nadia Petrova in the fourth-round match. 2002 runner-up Williams was ousted by the Russian with a score of 6-3, 6-4. Venus remains the biggest casualty of the tournament so far. On Court Philippe Chatrier, Venus missed two golden chances to break the Russian’s serve, and Petrova made her pay when she converted one of the break points to take a one set lead. Venus showed her resiliency in the second set when she broke Petrova early in the second set. The Russian fought back to break the American’s serve twice to take a 4-3 lead. Petrova carried forward the lead to seal the set and hence win the match. Petrova will now meet fellow Russian, the fifth seed Elena Dementieva, for a place in the semi-final. Dementieva earlier defeated South African qualifier Chanelle Scheepers 6-1, 6-3.
In another heavyweight clash, four-time champion Justine Henin defeated 12th seed Russian Maria Sharapova in a close match. Henin showed her class and experience when she fought back from score of 0-2 and 0-40 down in the final set to claim a 6-2, 3-6 and 6-3 victory that took her into the last 16. However, the triumph was short-lived, as the Belgian was defeated in the fourth-round by Australian 7th seed Samantha Stosur 2-6, 6-1, 6-4.
In other matches, Danish third seed Caroline Wozniacki survived a breathtaking three-hour encounter with Italy’s 14th seed Flavia Pennetta to reach the quarterfinals. Wozniacki was leading the first set with score of 4-2 when Pennetta showed her grit and battled back into the match. Pennetta even took the 5-4 lead in the first set but missed the chance to seal the set when she spurned the set point. On the other hand, the 3rd seed Danish took her chance to win the set in the tie-breaker. Pennetta levelled the match by winning the second set again in a tie-breaker. But the energy of young Caroline was too much for the Italian, as Wozniacki broke twice in the final set to close the match. 19 year old Wozniacki will now face another Italian, 17th seed Francesca Schiavone for a place in the semi-finals. Schiavone defeated 30th seed Maria Kirilenko, who earlier eliminated defending champion Svetlana Kuznetsova in the previous round. Schiavone won the match with a score of 6-4, 6-4 to set her match with the Danish teenager.
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