Serena, Mauresmo Bully Into 3rd Round at WTA Amelia Island
Posted on April 9, 2004
No. 2 seed Serena Williams and No. 3 Amelie Mauresmo again displayed the wide gap between the top players and the rest of the chud on the WTA Tour Wednesday, sweeping to sleep-inducing second round wins at Amelia Island. Serena pounded former slam winner Mary Pierce 6-3, 6-1 in approximately an hour, while Mauresmo barely broke a sweat in dismissing Japan's Akiko Morigami 6-0, 6-3, with more bagels coming out of Amelia Island than a New York City corner deli.
Serena was disappointed with her play, wishing to maybe cut her on-court time to -- 20 minutes? 15?
"I think I was a little gone and she was hitting a lot of winners and I didn't play as well as I could," Williams said. "By that I mean I wasn't focused as I would like to be. But I think my next round, I'll be able to pick it up."
There were three seeded losers on the day in (5)Elena Dementieva (l. to Kostanic, retiring with a bad hip), (13)Anna Smashnova-Pistolesi (l. to qualifier Strycova in a third-set breaker), and (15)Maggie Maleeva (l. to Sprem). The seeds into the third round were (6)Ai Sugiyama (d. Castano), (7)Nadia Petrova (d. Sequera, (who had just ousted Martina Navratilova) 6-1, 6-0), (9)Paola Suarez (d. Asagoe), (10)Silvia Farina Elia (d. Ruano Pascual), and (16)Conchita Martinez (d. Anabel "Funky Cold" Medina Garrigues).
In the lone all-unseeded match, Hungary's Petra Mandula eliminated American Amy "Down Goes" Frazier in two tiebreaks.
On court Thursday at Amelia are Mauresmo vs. Strycova, Henin-Hardenne vs. Martinez, Sprem vs. Serena, Schnyder vs. Zvonareva, Molik vs. Davenport, Farina Elia vs. Kostanic, Petrova vs. Mandula, and Sugiyama vs. Suarez.
Only four matches at the meek Casablanca stop Wednesday, with seeds (1)Emilie Loit (d. Talaja in three) and (8)Maria Elena Camerin (d. Martinez Granados) advancing, and un-seeds Klara "Kouky" Koukalova (d. Cohen-Aloro) and Marta Marrero (d. (Q)Gubacsi) also garnering victories on the dirt.
On tap for Thursday in Casablanca is another round of tongue-twisters in Pennetta vs. Kurhajcova, Birnerova vs. Cervanova, Mouhtassine vs. Grande, Domachowska vs. Leon Garcia. Tickets still on sale. For cheap.
Davis Cup Preview: France at Switzerland
This weekend features the Davis Cup quarterfinals, with Sweden at the U.S., Argentina at Belarus, France at Switzerland, and the Netherlands at Spain. Each day this week Tennis-X will preview one of the quarterfinal ties, leading to the beginning of the first day of singles play on Friday:
France at Switzerland
Site: Centre Intercommunal de Glace de Malley, Prilly, SUI
Surface: Hard (Opticourt) - Indoors
Ball Type: Wilson US Open Extra Duty High Visibility Felt
No one relishes an away tie against Team Roger Federer in Switzerland, especially with your best horse out with a virus. French Davis Cup captain Guy Forget must do without Sebastien Grosjean this weekend after the French No. 1 became ill last week at the Masters Series-Miami.
The loss is likely a death blow for the French team, since Grosjean has a 2-1 career advantage over Federer and was expected to do the damage in singles.
"I badly wanted to take my revenge on the Swiss," said Grosjean, who also missed the previous round against Croatia with injury.
"He caught a virus in Key Biscayne and is physically very weak," French captain Guy Forget told reporters on Tuesday. Not a big surprise, since when has the diminutive Grosjean not been either sick or injured of late?
France will announce their line-up later today, and is likely to include Arnaud Clement and the net-rushing Nicolas Escude in the singles, and possibly Michael Llodra and up-and-comer Julien Benneteau in the doubles.
The Swiss will likely go with the unhearalded Michel Kratochvil, even though he has played only one match this year, losing to Andrei Pavel in Switzerland’s first-round win over Romania.
"Federer is the best but their number two (Kratochvil) is within our reach. The doubles could make the difference and I see the match ending on the Sunday," the optimistic Forget said.
Swiss captain Marc Rosset could throw a curve and insert Ivo “I Used to Date Martina Hingis” Heuberger, who is a combined 5-8 this year in results at challenger and tour events, in the singles. But the biggest question mark will be the Swiss doubles, where captain Rosset must either decide to insert himself, or Yves Allegro who won a 10-8 fifth-set decider with Federer against Romania in February.
Last year Switzerland reached the semifinals for only the second time in the nation's 74-year history in the competition – but that was pre-No. 1 Roger Federer. This will be a rematch of last year’s World Group quarterfinals, where Federer was a one-man wrecking squad with straight-set wins over Escude and Fabrice Santoro, and a doubles win with Rosset over Escude/Santoro.
If Federer is totally recovered from his virus picked up in Miami, you have to give the nod to the Swiss at home. But if Club Fed is off the boil and drops either singles, it will be lights out for the Swiss.
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