by Richard Lucas
Photo Credit to Mark Peterson

(May 2, 2011)
As the Mutua Madrid Open continues today, many of the seeds moved along in their path towards the final, but a few were not so lucky. The #9 seed, Shahar Peer, and the #13 seed, Andrea Petkovic were both ousted in straight sets while Maria Sharapova struggled, being forced to a third set for the second straight match.

Despite what seemed like it should have been a relatively routine match for the WTA No. 15, Andrea Petkovic has been eliminated in Madrid thanks to a 2-6, 6-7 (5) defeat at the hands of Arantxa Parra Santonja. The Spaniard ranked 70 in the world plays with two hands off both sides and returned extremely well. Despite serving 70% first serves, Petkovic was only able to win 51% of points on first serves, and a paltry 29% on second serve points. In the end, giving up 6 breaks was too much to overcome.

Maria Sharapova had yet another shaky day on her own serve with 6 double faults despite serving 77% on first serves. She spread out her mistakes on serve and managed to face only one break point, which she lost in the process of dropping the second set. In the third set, Sharapova began jumping on the serve of Ekaterina Makarova to close it out with a 6-3, 3-6, 6-1 victory. With the win today, Sharapova is approaching the four hour mark worth of court time in only two matches, against players ranked 106 and 39.

Many of the other seeds moved through comfortably, such as Victoria Azarenka who returned from injury this week and defeated Sofia Arvidsson 6-1, 6-1. Other seeds advancing today included Li Na and Vera Zvonareva, who has recently started working with a new coach, Karen Krotov. Notable winners today include, Dinara Safina, Lucie Safarova, Iveta Benesova, Roberta Vinci, and Alisa Kleybanova, who eliminated Peer 6-3, 6-2.