Serbs run amok in Paris

Source: Agencies  |   2008-6-2  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

SERBIA'S Ana Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic enjoyed starkly contrasting fourth-round wins at the French Open in Paris yesterday while teenager Ernests Gulbis thrust Latvia on the tennis map.

Second seed Ivanovic played with the urgency of a woman late for a lunch appointment as she ruthlessly dismantled Czech Petra Cetkovska 6-0, 6-0 in 54 minutes on Court Philippe Chatrier.

While Ivanovic's win was painfully easy, Jankovic's was just downright painful.

Jankovic needed a 10-minute medical timeout after game three of the second set against Poland's Agnieszka Radwanska before she crawled past the finishing line with a 6-3, 7-6 (3) victory.

"The whole arm is a mess," said Jankovic, who resembled a wrestler pinned to the floor as the tournament trainer massaged her arm and shoulder back to life.

"I started to feel the pain in the beginning of the second set and since then it's been pain, pain, pain," said the 23-year-old, who will next face Spain's Carla Suarez Navarro.s

Suarez Navarro ousted No. 26 Flavia Pennetta, who beat Venus Williams on Friday, 6-3, 6-2. The 19-year-old Suarez Navarro is the first qualifier to reach the women's quarterfinals since Petra Mandula in 2001.

The Paris crowd had barely got through the scrum at the turnstiles as Ivanovic, who by each passing minute looks like improving on her runner-up finish of last year, showed no mercy against the lamentable Cetkovska.

The unseeded Czech, who had not dropped a set in the tournament, looked like a decent threat going on a high-quality opening rally, but once Ivanovic got her eye in she folded quicker than a bad poker hand.

Ivanovic pounded her with winners and even when the Czech carved out two break points in game five of the second, she slouched with a knowing smile when Ivanovic snuffed out any whiff of a comeback.

"It was much tougher than it probably looked, or the results indicates," said a generous Ivanovic, who has lost a paltry 15 games at Roland Garros so far this year. "I had to work really hard."

Latvia has one man in the world's top 350, and only two women in the top 500, but fortunately for the Baltic state Gulbis is single-handedly cranking up his country's tennis pedigree.

The world No. 80 had already disposed of seventh seed James Blake in round two, and a 6-4, 7-6 (4), 6-3 win over Frenchman Michael Llodra yesterday earned him his first place in a grand slam quarterfinal.

Gulbis, 19, silenced the fiercely partisan crowd on Suzanne Lenglen Court with a barrage of aces.