Serena a stylish winner
NEW YORK – The bling don’t mean a thing if she ain’t got that swing.
Serena Williams had it all – the $40,000 diamond chandelier earrings upgraded with 3-carat studs, the 10-carat diamond choker, the sweet swings that had been missing as she flashed her best tennis of the U.S. Open on Friday.
Williams, taking on a seeded player for the first time in the tournament, avenged a loss to Italy’s Francesca Schiavone at Rome in May with a 6-3, 6-4 victory. Next up in the fourth round for the No. 8 Williams is her sister and fellow two-time champion, No. 10 Venus, who followed her in the stadium with a 6-3, 6-3 win against No. 20 Daniela Hantuchova.
“I’m feeling, actually, the best I’ve felt in a really long time,” Serena said.
Venus, bejeweled less lavishly but glittering in lavender, felt just as good on court in front of an Open-record night crowd of 23,352.
“Are you guys ready for the Williams sisters?” she asked the fans, then laughed as they responded with cheers. “Yeah. We’ll see you on Sunday. It’s going to be a lot of hard hitting, it’s going to be a lot of hard serving. We’ll both have a few tricks up our sleeves.”
Neither sister wanted to meet this early in the tournament. Six of their eight Grand Slam matches against each other have been in finals, Serena winning the last five. This ninth clash in a major is the earliest since the second round of the 1998 Australian Open, which Venus won in straight sets.
“It’s obviously extremely disappointing to have to play my sister in the next round,” Serena said. “She’s playing unbelievable. I’m just going to have to pick it up.”
Venus, who won Wimbledon two months ago, also is getting better round by round. Yet she knows that her toughest test is coming up.
“At the end of the day it doesn’t matter how Serena is playing,” Venus said. “Her competitive spirit is so high. You have to go to the ends of the earth to beat her.”
On a sun-dappled day with balmy breezes, No. 1 Maria Sharapova, No. 4 Kim Clijsters and No. 9 Nadia Petrova won in straight sets.
Men’s No. 1 Roger Federer watched Fabrice Santoro entertain the late night crowd and win points on a few trick shots – one between his legs, running with his back to the net; another with a behind-the-back volley; still another with a flick of the wrist while turned around. Federer was less showy, doing just enough to beat him 7-5, 7-5, 7-6 (2).
“I can’t play better than I did tonight,” said Santoro, a Frenchman who lives in Federer’s homeland of Switzerland.
“It’s always a pleasure to play against him because it’s so different,” Federer said. “It was because of him, not because of me, that the match was so great.”
In other men’s matches, No. 3 Lleyton Hewitt won in straight sets, unseeded Paradorn Srichaphan upset No. 6 Nikolay Davydenko, No. 11 David Nalbandian won in four over Peter Wessels, unseeded Novak Djokovic beat No. 22 Mario Ancic, and No. 25 Taylor Dent became the only American in the third round in the top half of the draw.