Ivanovic crashes out of US Open

7:34am Friday 29th August 2008

Top seed Ana Ivanovic was stunned at the US Open on Thursday as she was defeated 6-3 4-6 6-3 by Julie Coin in the second round.

Ranked 188th in the word, Frenchwoman Coin recorded eight aces and benefited from 34 unforced errors by Ivanovic to bounce the Serb from the tournament.

"I was nervous going onto the court because I never saw (Coin) play before, so I didn't know what to expect," Ivanovic said. "I thought I can slowly get into the match, and she played completely different than I expected. She was serving extremely well and hitting very powerful shots."

Coin's next opponent is number 32 Amelie Mauresmo of France, who rallied for a 2-6 6-4 6-0 triumph over Kaia Kanepi of Estonia.

Serena and Venus Williams both disposed of their second-round opponents at the US Open just as easily as their first. Seventh-seeded Venus needed less than an hour to dispatch Paraguay's Rossana De Los Rios 6-0 6-3 in the year's final major championship, while number four Serena cruised past Russia's Elena Vesnina 6-1 6-1 in just 58 minutes.

Seeking her eighth major championship, Venus did not face a break point and converted four of the eight she had en route to the easy victory. De Los Rios had no answer to the power of her opponent, who won 81 percent of points on her first serve and cracked 17 winners.

"I think I just had a lot more power than she did today," Venus said. "She plays a game where she hits a lot of high balls. ... I think it would be effective against a lot of players, but with my height and my reach, it doesn't phase me as much. I think that helped me."

Up next for Venus is number 27 Alona Bondarenko of the Ukraine, who defeated German Sabine Lisicki 6-4 1-6 6-4 on Thursday while Serena next will take on the 30th-seeded Ai Sugiyama of Japan, who ousted Belarus' Olga Govortsova 4-6 7-6 (7/4) 6-1. A matchup with Venus would come in the quarterfinals.

Russian Dinara Safina, the sixth seed, continued to build off the momentum of her silver-medal performance at the Beijing Olympics when she defeated Italy's Roberta Vinci 6-4 6-3. Number nine Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland, a quarterfinalist at Wimbledon who defeated Colombia's 19-year-old Mariana Duque Marino 6-0 7-6 (7/3).

Russian Nadia Petrova, the 19th seed, also advanced with a 6-4 6-2 victory over Tapei's Su-Wei Hsieh. Two seeded players fell Thursday, including number 20 Nicole Vaidisova of the Czech Republic, who was ousted by France's Severine Bremond 7-5 6-3. Thirteenth seed Agnes Szavay of Hungary was eliminated by Italy's Tathiana Garbin 5-7 6-2 6-3. Number 16 Flavia Pennetta, number 17 Alize Cornet and number 18 Dominika Cibulkova were the other seeded players to advance.

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