Serena Williams has advanced to the fourth round of Australian Open 2010 after beating Carla Suarez Navarro 6-0 6-3 in a bizarre encounter at Hisense Arena on Saturday.
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Until the 15-minute mark of the match, Williams played flawless tennis, committing no unforced errors and losing just six points to take a 5-0 lead.
Inexplicably, as the American was poised to serve out the opener, her game appeared to disintegrate, with formerly precise groundstrokes suddenly sailing clear over the
baseline point after point.
No less than 13 deuces, nine unforced errors and six missed Suarez Navarro break point opportunities later, the world No.1 eventually found a way to hold a service game
that, at 23-minutes in duration, lasted eight minutes longer than the rest of the first set.
Both women continued to struggle to keep the ball in the court at the start of the second set, the opening two games going with serve as the unforced error count
mounted.
Williams broke in the third game of the set to take a 2-1 lead and, although seemingly devoid of the stroke-making confidence with which she started the match, managed
to maintain that advantage until the ninth game, where she again broke the Suarez Navarro serve to clinch the match.
"Yeah, I think it was definitely the toughest 6‑0 set (of my career)," said Williams after the match.
"I really enjoyed the game and I really had a lot of fun. I thought, ‘Okay, Serena, don't put too much pressure on this. Worst case scenario it will be 5‑1’.
"But, way to keep fighting. Especially in the end, because she was really fighting for it. I was too. I didn't want to lose that game. At the end of day I'm glad I
didn't lose that game."
She attributed her wobble in form to the sun at the northern end of Hisense Arena.
"It was so sunny on this one end. Usually in a match like that, you know it's gonna be one or two games you're gonna serve in the sun. I couldn't see the ball, and it
was um, tough. But I was able to get through it."
The defending women's singles champion, Williams now takes on Australian world No. 13 Sam Stosur in the fourth round.
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