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Mirza books meeting with Venus in Charleston
India's Sania Mirza booked a second-round clash with second-seeded Venus Williams on Tuesday with a straight-sets victory in the one million-dollar Family Circle Cup.
India's Sania Mirza booked a second-round clash with second-seeded Venus Williams on Tuesday with a straight-sets victory in the one million-dollar Family Circle Cup.
Sania Mirza beat Sesil Karatantcheva of Kazakhstan 6-4, 6-4 to line up the marquee meeting with Williams, who will be launching her campaign on Wednesday afternoon after enjoying a first-round bye.
Top-seeded Russian Elena Dementieva, who rose to a career-high ranking of number three in the world last week, reached the third round with a dominant 6-0, 6-2 victory over American Julie Ditty.
"I don't feel any pressure being the number one seed here," Dementieva said. "Tonight was a good start to the tournament for me. I had never played Julie before so I really didn't want her to get into the match. It's easy to lose your concentration. I really stayed focused tonight."
Third-seeded Vera Zvonareva and number four Nadia Petrova, both of Russia, also reached the third round, as did sixth-seeded Marion Bartoli of France and seventh-seeded Slovakian Dominika Cibulkova.
Zvonareva cruised past Paraguay's Rossana de los Rios 6-3, 6-2.
"I felt pretty good for my first match of the year on clay," said Zvonareva, a finalist here last year. "I didn't expect myself to play my best, and it was a bit of a struggle at times because of the wind, but it was pretty good."
Fourth-seeded Petrova beat Austrian Patricia Mayr 6-1, 2-6, 6-2, Bartoli defeated Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia 6-1, 6-3 and Cibulkova downed Austrian Tamira Paszek 6-4, 6-0.
