Murray storms ahead as Venus, Li also advance
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ANDY Murray obliterated the second obstacle blocking his path to consecutive Wimbledon titles yesterday as he ended Blaz Rola’s All England Club adventure in brutal fashion.
The home favorite, who last year ended Britain’s 77-year hunt for a men’s singles champion, flattened the Slovenian 6-1, 6-1, 6-0 to reach the third round without dropping a set and stretch his winning streak in London to 15.
Veteran American Venus Williams, another player who thrives at the spiritual home of lawn tennis, if not in recent years because of illness and injury, battled into the third round with 7-6 (4), 6-1 defeat of Japan’s Kurumi Nara.
Williams, level with younger sister Serena on five Wimbledon singles titles, missed last year’s tournament and exited in the first round in 2012 but the 30th seed hopes she can at least join her sibling in the second week this time.
“I guess I haven’t held up my end of the bargain,” the 34-year-old said of her struggles. “I tried. I just haven’t had the luck I’ve wanted.”
She meets another former champion Petra Kvitova in the third round after the Czech made easy work of Germany’s Mona Barthel 6-2, 6-0.
Women’s seeds flourished in cool, sunny conditions early on Day 3 with world No. 2 Li Na untroubled by Austria’s Yvonne Meusburger in a 6-2, 6-2 victory and 2012 runner-up Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland, seeded four, opening action on Centre Court with a 6-4, 6-0 win over Australia’s Casey Dellacqua.
Li, 32, goes on to face Barbora Zahlavova Strycova of the Czech Republic. She said she was unconcerned about her 21 unforced errors. “If you want to play more aggressive, this is the normal way,” the Australian Open champion explained.
Meusburger had only four winners in the match, compared to 33 for Li.
Li, also the 2011 French Open champion, reached the quarterfinals at the All England Club last year.
Twelfth seed Ernests Gulbis’s hopes of making an impact following his semifinal run at Roland Garros ended in defeat to Ukraine’s Sergiy Stakhovsky 4-6, 3-6, 6-7 (5).
The Latvian is the highest-ranked men’s casualty so far although defeat by the net-rushing Stakhovsky, the man who knocked out seven-time champion Roger Federer at the same stage last year, was not a complete surprise.
“Two of my biggest weapons, my serve and return, wasn’t there,” said the 25-year-old.
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