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Catwalk for Venus, cakewalk for Federer in Paris
(Agencies)
Updated: 2010-05-27 12:00
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Venus Williams of the US plays a shot during her match against Arantxa Parra Santonja of Spain at the French Open tennis tournament at Roland Garros in Paris, May 26, 2010. [Agencies] |
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Venus Williams of the US returns the ball to Arantxa Parra Santonja of Spain during the French Open tennis tournament at Roland Garros in Paris May 26, 2010. [Agencies] |
Slide: French Open tennis tournament
Sartorial elegance
Asked to explain the outfit that she designed especially for Roland Garros and which also requires her to wear flesh-coloured underwear, Venus was happy to oblige.
"It's really about the illusion," she said. "The illusion of just having bare skin is definitely a lot more beautiful."
Federer's sartorial elegance at Wimbledon is well-known but really nothing can top the grace and elegance of his tennis.
That was the case again on Wednesday against Falla although initially he did struggle with his timing -- shanking several unforced errors off his frame as his south American opponent made all the early running.
Federer, without a title since the Australian Open, had managed just three points on Falla's serve in the first 11 games but when he needed to find another gear he did, breaking his opponent when in trouble at 6-5 down before winning a tiebreak.
Twice the players were forced off by rain that interrupted the schedule all day but Federer kept his game together and suffered no further alarms.
"I think he really pushed me to come up with something special, which I couldn't do in the first set," Federer told reporters. "I definitely got a little bit lucky to get out of that one.
Robin Soderling, Federer's victim in last year's final, is looming as a quarter-final opponent this year and the Swede was the most impressive player in second-round action on Wednesday, demolishing American Taylor Dent 6-0 6-1 6-1 in 71 minutes.
Eigth seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga also reached the third round with a straight-sets win over fellow Frenchman Josselin Ouanna while Marin Cilic of Croatia continued to impress, beating Daniel Gimeno-Traver of Spain 6-3 7-6 6-2.
Kuznetsova looked to be joining Dinara Safina, the fellow Russian she beat in last year's final, out of the tournament when Petkovic served as 5-4, 40-0 in the second set.
However, the 22-year-old German tightened up badly to let Kuznetsova off the hook and the paid the price as the sixth seed finally found some form to win 4-6 7-5 6-4.
