Washington, DC
17 January 2008
Top seed Roger Federer, women's second seed Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia, and Serbians Novak Djokovic and Ana Invanovic have all advanced at the Australian Open tennis tournament in Melbourne.
Federer, the defending champion and world No. 1, took just one hour, 21 minutes to get by France's Fabrice Santoro 6-1, 6-2, 6-0.
Number three seed Novak Djokovic of Serbia beat Italy's Simone Bolelli 6-1, 6-2, 6-2. Fifth seed David Ferrer of Spain advanced when his opponent, Juan Martin del Potro of Argentina, retired at the beginning of the third set. Seventh seeded Fernando Gonzalez of Chile defeated Lee Hyung-taik of South Korea in four sets (4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-4).
In the night match, former runner-up Marcos Baghdatis of Cyrpus and former champion Marat Safin of Russia took five sets and more than three hours to decide their match. In the end, Baghdatis beat Safin in five sets, 6-4, 6-4, 2-6, 3-6, 6-2.
On the women's side, Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia won her second-round match against Bulgaria's Tsvetana Pironkova 7-6, 6-2. Fourth seed Ana Ivanovic of Serbia defeated Tathiana Garbin of Italy (6-0, 6-3).
Sixth seeded Anna Chakvetadze of Russia downed Alisa Kleybanova of Russia (6-3, 6-4). American Venus Williams beat France's Camille Pin (7-5, 6-4). Daniela Hantuchova of Slovakia ousted Alize Cornet of France (6-2, 7-5).
Other men's winners included 10th seeded David Nalbandian of Argentina, 12th seed James Blake of the United States, Tomas Berdych of the Czech Republic and Lleyton Hewitt of Australia. Other winners in women's playing included Nadia Petrova of Russia, Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark, Li Na of China and Maria Kirilenko of Russia.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP, AP and Reuters.