Williams, Safina, Jankovic advance
ROME -- Top-ranked Dinara Safina rallied past Zheng Jie 5-7, 6-1, 7-6 (3) on Wednesday to reach the quarterfinals of the Italian Open, while defending champion Jelena Jankovic advanced after her opponent retired with an illness.
Need the scores from any match played in today's tournaments? Venus Williams struggled to defeat Anna Chakvetadze 6-0, 6-7 (8), 6-4, and Ana Ivanovic squandered a four-game lead in the decisive set against Agnieszka Radwanska to lose 6-1, 3-6, 6-4.
Safina is looking to win her first title since becoming No. 1 last month.
The 23-year-old Russian had an erratic game Wednesday, losing her serve seven times. But Safina rallied from 5-2 down in the third set and won the last six points of the tiebreak.
"I'm upset with myself," Safina said. "I'm practicing and I'm playing great and aggressive, and suddenly I come on the court and it's completely ... different person playing. Way too passive."
The fourth-seeded Williams played from the baseline but frequently came to the net to finish off points, cruising through the first set in 23 minutes.
But Chakvetadze raised her game, and Williams committed unforced errors and wasted a match point in the second-set tiebreak before regaining her focus in the third set.
Patty Schnyder, who defeated Serena Williams in three sets in a match that ended early Wednesday, lost 6-3, 6-0 to 16th-seeded Kaia Kanepi.
Jankovic led 6-1, 1-0 when Kateryna Bondarenko of Ukraine called for the trainer and withdrew because of the flu. Jankovic will play Svetlana Kuznetsova, who ousted crowd favorite Flavia Pennetta of Italy 6-3, 3-6, 6-0.
Ivanovic, the French Open champion, started off poorly and couldn't hold serve in the first set. She began dictating play with precise groundstrokes in the second and appeared headed toward victory with a 4-0 lead in the final set.
Radwanska thought otherwise. Playing solid and consistent tennis, the 20-year-old won the last six games, ending the match with one of her 19 winners.
"She played extremely well and hardly made any errors," Ivanovic said. "She's a great mover, and she was retrieving lots of balls."
The seventh-ranked Ivanovic had 31 winners but committed 32 unforced errors -- 20 more than her opponent.
Jankovic and Bondarenko were on court for 35 minutes.
"I would have loved to finish the match, because I was playing pretty well in that first set," Jankovic said. "I felt the ball really well and I had good timing."
Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press
