Venus moves into quarters
MELBOURNE, Australia – Venus Williams advanced to the Australian Open quarterfinals for the seventh time to set up a meeting with Li Na, who helped make more Chinese history.
The sixth-seeded Williams beat Francesca Schiavone 3-6, 6-2, 6-1 early today, recovering after dropping a set to the Italian for the first time since 2003.
Li upset No. 4 seed Caroline Wozniacki 6-3, 6-2 in a 98-minute match featuring 12 service breaks. Li held when it counted, saving three break-point chances against the U.S. Open finalist in an 11-minute opening game. She also served it out on her second match point.
Li’s progress means there’s two Chinese players in the quarterfinals of the same major for the first time. Zheng Jie, the 2008 Wimbledon semifinalist, is into the quarters on the other half of the draw.
“Nothing better,” Li said, smiling, “Yeah, I mean good for us.”
Williams has won seven singles majors and reached the final of the Australian Open in ’03, losing to her younger sister Serena, in her best run at Melbourne Park.
The Williams sisters are on track to meet in the semifinals here, with defending champion and No. 1-ranked Serena playing in a fourth-round match later today against Australia’s Sam Stosur. Serena has won four of her 11 Grand Slam singles titles in Australia.
In men’s fourth-round matches, 2008 champion Novak Djokovic beat Poland’s Lukasz Kubot 6-1, 6-2, 7-5 today, and Andy Roddick got a crucial call in his favor in a fourth-round win over Fernando Gonzalez on Sunday night.
Roddick held off the 2007 Australian Open finalist 6-3, 3-6, 4-6, 7-5, 6-2 to reach the quarters for the sixth time in eight years. He’ll meet No. 14 Marin Cilic of Croatia, who ousted U.S. Open champion Juan Martin del Potro in five sets.
Roddick bucked the trend on a day of upsets that also resulted in fourth-round exits for two of the top women: No. 2 Dinara Safina, last year’s runner-up, and No. 3 Svetlana Kuznetsova, the reigning French Open champion.
“I got a little lucky, but sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good,” he said.
Seventh-seeded Roddick rallied from 40-0 down in the 12th game of the fourth set to earn a fifth set point. Then he hit the contentious, dipping forehand.
The ball was called out and Gonzalez didn’t take a swing. Roddick challenged the call immediately, and the evidence showed that the ball just caught the line, giving Roddick the set to level at 2-all and igniting a protest from Gonzalez.
The Chilean argued that he could have had a play on the ball but chair umpire Enric Molina declined to replay the point.
Safina had to retire because of the recurrence of a back injury when she was serving at 5-4 down and 30-40 against Maria Kirilenko, who had upset 2008 champion Maria Sharapova in the first round.
Kuznetsova lost 6-3, 3-6, 6-1 to Nadia Petrova.
Former No. 1 Justine Henin continued her run in her first Grand Slam tournament in two years with a 7-6 (3), 1-6, 6-3 win over fellow Belgian Yanina Wickmayer.