Tennis latest: Vera Zvonareva breezes into Pan Pacific Open quarters
The professional tennis player from Russia, Vera Zvonareva advanced into the quarter final round of the Toray Pan Pacific Women’s Open tennis tournament in Tokyo on the very first occasion after getting the better of Roberta Vinci from Italy on Wednesday.
The second seed Russian sensation, who achieved her career highest ranking of number four in the world by the Women Tennis Association after ending as runner-up at the United States Open tennis tournament in New York this season, won the final seven games in a row to earn a two-setter win in the round three on Wednesday. The final match score was 6-4, 6-0.
In her last two visits to Tokyo, Vera was defeated in the opening round on both occasions at the hands of Samantha Stosur from Australia back in 2007 and to Alisa Kleybanova from Russia last season.
Zvonareva, however, was quite satisfied with the way she battled in her today’s match at the Toray Pan Pacific Women’s Open tennis tournament in Tokyo but still believes that her game needs to improve.
"Overall I think I played a good match, but there is still room for improvement, particularly with consistency. I need to be more consistent and I didn't show my best today, but I played well when I needed to," said Vera after the match.
The Russian further added, "The conditions were different today, the roof was open and it was windy and we had to get used to the conditions which affected both our games throughout the match, but overall, I am happy with the way I played.”
In the quarters on Thursday, Vera will meet a gold medallist at the Beijing Olympics Games, Elena Dementieva from Russia, who is seeded number seven to win the title in Tokyo. She had to bounce back from an early service break down to get the better of her Italian tennis foe, Flavia Pennetta in a total of two sets. The final match score was 6-4, 6-2.
In other third round clashes, Marion Bartoli from France abandoned her encounter as a result of viral illness she lost the opening set 2-6 to Victoria Azarenka from Beralus, who is seeded eight in Tokyo.
American Coco Vandeweghe registered her name as the only qualifier to advance to the quarter-finals when she overpowered Julia Goerges from Germany in a two-setter clash. The final match score was 6-3, 6-0.
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