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Serena Williams, Federer reach Aussie Open 4th round


MELBOURNE, Australia — Serena Williams moved a step closer to successfully defending her Australian Open title and extracted some family revenge Saturday with a 6-0, 6-3 victory over Carla Suarez Navarro. Last year, Suarez Navarro beat Serena’s sister Venus in the second round. The Spaniard didn't even get close this time. Serena Williams' only real difficulty at Hisense Arena was in closing the first set, needing eight set points in a game that went to deuce 13 times and lasted longer than the previous five games combined. Top-ranked Roger Federer had a 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 win over No. 31 Albert Montanes to register his 50th win at Melbourne Park, where he has won three of his record 15 Grand Slam singles titles. "It was important to come through the first week," Federer said. "I feel good, I feel confident. Physically I'm fine and mentally fresh and that's the way you want to go into the second week." Nikolay Davydenko, Federer's potential quarterfinal opponent, extended his impressive winning run with a 6-0, 6-3, 6-4 victory over No. 30 Juan Monaco of Argentina. Davydenko will face Fernando Verdasco, who lost an epic, five-set semifinal to eventual champion and fellow Spaniard Rafael Nadal last year. Verdasco advanced when Austria's Stefan Koubek retired due to sickness after losing the first set 6-1. The sixth-seeded Davydenko counts wins against Federer and Nadal at last year's World Tour Final and this season's opening event at Doha among his 12-match winning streak. The 28-year-old Russian has never gone beyond the quarterfinals at the Australian Open, and his best runs at a major ended in semifinal defeats at the French and U.S. Opens. Women's No. 1 Williams, who has won the Australian title each odd-numbered year since beating sister Venus in the 2003 final, will next play No. 13 and local hope Sam Stosur, a 6-4, 6-1 winner over Italian Alberta Brianti. She finished of Suarez Navarro, a quarterfinalist here last year, on her third match point in 1 hour, 21 minutes. Venus Williams faced Australian Casey Dellacqua later Saturday. No. 7 Victoria Azarenka of Belarus had a 6-0, 6-2 win over Italy's Tathiana Garbin in an early match to set up a fourth-round match against No. 9 Vera Zvonareva of Russia, who beat Argentina's Gisela Dulko 6-1, 7-5. Play started slightly late due to light drizzle around Melbourne, which cleared toward midday. It only took seconds for the first result to be registered, however, with No. 20 Mikhail Youzhny withdrawing from his scheduled third-round match against Poland's Lukasz Kubot due to wrist pain. No. 3-ranked Novak Djokovic, who beat Federer in the semifinals en route to his 2008 title here, was set to play Denis Istomin later Saturday. Kim Clijsters came to the Australian Open as an inspiration to her countrywomen and mothers everywhere after her unexpected U.S. Open victory. Any chance of back-to-back major titles ended in 52 minutes Friday evening in a 6-0, 6-1 third-round loss to 19th-seeded Nadia Petrova. Also lost was the chance of a quarterfinal against fellow Belgian Justine Henin, a former No. 1 playing her first major in two years. "I was completely off," Clijsters said. "I think tennis-wise, I didn't feel the ball at all." Defending champion Nadal also was upset with his game, although he had a victory to show for it — a 6-4, 6-2, 2-6, 7-5 decision over Germany's Philipp Kohlscreiber at night. "In the third, I started terrible, no?" the Spaniard said. "Everybody has not very good days." Juan Martin del Potro, who had a surprise win over Federer in the U.S. Open final last September, advanced Friday night along with No. 5 Andy Murray, Americans John Isner and Andy Roddick and Fernando Gonzalez of Chile. Nadal will play Ivo Karlovic, who downed Ivan Ljubicic 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (7), and could play a quarterfinal against Murray, a 7-5, 6-1, 6-4 winner over Florent Serra of France. But Murray has to first get past Isner, a 6-foot-9 American who won his first title last week in Auckland. "I was just kind of riding a wave of momentum, and I still am," Isner said after his 6-1, 4-6, 7-6 (4), 7-6 (5) win over No. 12 Gael Monfils. "Hopefully I can keep it going." No. 2 Dinara Safina and No. 3 Svetlana Kuznetsova went through and will be part of two all-Russian women's matches in the last 16. Belgians Henin and Yanina Wickmayer will vie for a place in the quarterfinals. Former No. 1-ranked Henin, who was inspired to come back to the tour after watching Clijsters and her toddler daughter, Jada, celebrating the championship at Flushing Meadows last September, found a way into the fourth round after recovering from a set and a break down to beat Alisa Kleybanova 3-6, 6-4, 6-2. Kuznetsova, the French Open champion who no doubt expected to play Clijsters, is just happy to get a chance at fellow Russian Petrova after holding off Germany's Angelique Kerber 3-6, 7-5, 6-4. – AP
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