Eighth seed Venus Williams moved into the Australian Open quarterfinals with a 6-4 6-4 victory over talented Polish qualifier Marta Domachowska on Monday.
The Wimbledon champion, who had her right thigh strapped, recovered from an early breakdown to win the first set and staved off a late fightback from the Pole to line up a clash with fourth seed Ana Ivanovic.
Having overcome two free hitters in Camille Pin and Sania Mirza on her way to the last 16, Williams said it was nice to face someone more orthodox.
”The last couple of rounds I’ve definitely played some players who had some interesting strategies as far as going for broke and just [hitting] every ball as hard as they can a 100%,” Williams told reporters.
”So it’s definitely different to play that kind of match opposed to someone who is playing more normal tennis. So I felt good about the match.
”She made a lot of good shots there, but just tried to keep a steady level of play.”
World number 146 Domachowska, in the last 16 of a Grand Slam-event for the first time, broke Williams on her way to a 3-1 lead but the American won five of the next six games to take the set.
Williams squandered a match point when she was broken serving for the match at 5-3 but she broke Domachowska again to clinch victory after 79 minutes.
”For me it was an amazing experience to play today against Venus on the centre court,” she said. ”I hope I can continue like this all year.
”I had some chances. I had a lot of chances, especially in the first set, but I didn’t use them very well. When I had the chance, then I was doing easy mistakes.
”She’s a great player. I was trying to do my best, but she was better than me.” – Reuters