Vera Zvonareva, the No. 2 seed, had to fight hard, but overcame a determined No. 31 seed, Lucie Safarova in their 3rd round match Saturday at the 2011 Australian Open in Melbourne winning 6-3, 7-6 (11-9).
Zvonareva broke former doubles partner Safarova once in the first set and looked as though she would cruise to victory when she broke again at the start of the second.
However, Zvonareva seemed to tighten up toward the end of the 2nd set and she lost her serve three times in a row as Safarova recovered to send the set into a tiebreak.
Both players were swinging freely and scrambling for every point as the high quality tiebreak swung back and forth.
Safarova had two set points and Zvonareva two match points before a Safarova forehand sailed long, giving the Russian victory in exactly two hours.
Zvonareva hit 21 winners (4 aces) with 24 errors (6 double faults); Safarova had 29 winners (no aces), but with 38 errors (9 double faults).
Zvonareva, who has a chance to be world number one at the end tournament if results fall her way, has progressed through the Australian Open with little fanfare as most of the attention has fallen on higher profile players.
Zvonareva has yet to win a Grand Slam title. She reached the 4th round at the Australian Open and was also a finalist at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open in 2010,
Her next opponent is unseeded No. 60 Iveta Benesova of the Czech Republic.
