Venus through after struggle

 

Originally published on: 26/02/10 12:30

Clay is comfortably Williams’ least favourite surface and she has only progressed beyond the quarter-finals once at Roland Garros, when she lost the 2002 final to sister Serena.

She claimed a 6-1 4-6 6-2 win over Mattek-Sands to clinch a second-round meeting with either Lucie Safarova or Sabine Lisicki, but was again far from convincing on the dirt.

Other seeds to advance on the second day of action were China’s Jie Zheng and Hungary’s Agnes Szavay.

Zheng, the 15th seed, eased past France’s Stephanie Cohen-Aloro 6-1 6-3 and Szavay, the 29th seed, beat Corinna Dentoni 6-3 6-4.

One seed to fall was Alisa Kleybanova (23), the Russian going down 6-2 4-6 6-1 to Polona Hercog of Slovenia.

Tamarine Tanasugarn and Kirsten Flipkens also made it through to the next round, while Aravane Rezai overcame Ai Sugiyama 6-3 6-2.

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