Francesca Schiavone repeated her French Open final triumph over Samantha Stosur on Sunday as Fed Cup holders Italy completed a 4-1 victory over Australia in their World Group last eight tie.
Top seed Caroline Wozniacki out-muscled Victoria Azarenka of Belarus 6-2, 6-7, 6-4 to reach the final of the Pan Pacific Open on Friday.
Caroline Wozniacki dragged herself back from the brink to power into the semi-finals of the Australian Open with a gritty 3-6, 6-3, 6-3 win over a dogged Francesca Schiavone on Tuesday.
French Open champion Li Na was upset 6-2, 5-7, 7-6 by Czech qualifier Petra Cetkovska in the semi-finals of the New Haven Open on Friday. Cetkovska, ranked a career-high 40th, will face world number one Caroline Wozniacki in Saturday's final, the Dane having beaten Italy's Francesca Schiavone 7-6, 6-3 in the last four.
Elena Dementieva lost 6-4, 6-2 to Italy's Francesca Schiavone at the WTA Championships on Friday before stunning the crowd by announcing her retirement from tennis.
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Caroline Wozniacki rolled up her sleeves and battled back from a set down to defeat Francesca Schiavone of Italy 3-6, 6-1, 6-1 at the WTA Championships on Thursday, sewing up the year-end world number one ranking.
Elena Dementieva has pulled out of next week's Wimbledon because of a calf injury, the Russian world number five said on Tuesday. The 28-year-old Muscovite suffered the injury during the French Open, forcing her to retire from her semi-final earlier this month against eventual winner Francesca Schiavone.
Francesca Schiavone can offer plenty of ideas about how to succeed on clay. When it comes to grass, however, she has only one suggestion.
Elena Dementieva and Jelena Jankovic, two of the nearly women of the game, will bid for another crack at Grand Slam glory in the French Open semi-finals on Thursday.
French Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova and her fellow Russian Elena Dementieva won their opening round matches at the Sydney International Sunday, one of the major lead-up events to the Australian Open.
A gale force in the shape of Roger Federer blew aside local favourite Gael Monfils 6-4, 6-3, 7-6 on a blustery Tuesday at the French Open as the Swiss set up a mouth-watering French Open semi-final with Novak Djokovic.
Italy's newly crowned French Open champion Francesca Schiavone fell at the first hurdle at Wimbledon on Monday, losing 6-7, 7-5, 6-1 to Russian Vera Dushevina.
Sania Mirza and her Italian partner Francesca Schiavone, seeded 14th, survived a scare from unseeded Ekaterina Dzehalevich of Belarus and Czech Renata Voracova before recording a 5-7, 7-5, 6-1 win to advance to the women's doubles second round.
Sania Mirza's campaign ended with a straight-set defeat in the women's doubles' third round on a disappointing day for the Indians at the Australian Open in Melbourne on Sunday.
It took 12 years of hard graft to finally realise her dream but Francesca Schiavone said the long wait made her French Open title taste even sweeter.
An inspired Francesca Schiavone became the first Italian woman to win a Grand Slam singles title on Saturday when she beat Australia's Samantha Stosur in the final of the French Open.
A jet-lagged Andy Murray won his opening match of the year on Monday but it was not enough to prevent Britain from losing 2-1 to Italy in the Hopman Cup mixed team event.
Third seed and home favourite Mikhail Youzhny beat Serbia's Janko Tipsarevic 6-7, 6-0, 6-4 in a see-saw Kremlin Cup final on Sunday to win his fifth ATP title.
Italian top seed Flavia Pennetta advanced to the final of the Auckland Classic after thumping doubles partner Francesca Schiavone 6-3, 6-0 in under an hour on Friday
Sania Mirza suffered her fourth successive defeat, a straight set mauling, at the hands of Italian Francesca Schiavone and crashed out of the ASB Classic WTA tournament in Auckland on Wednesday. The Indian ace lost 0-6, 3-6 to her fourth seeded opponent in the second round of the US $220,000 hard court event, thus making a disappointing start to the season. She also lost in the doubles.
Indian tennis star Sania Mirza will pair up with former doubles number one Virginia Ruano Pascual of Spain in the Australian Open next month.
The 29-year-old American romped to a 5-0 lead against Poland's Agnieszka Radwanska and completed a 6-1 6-2 victory on auto-pilot as slumbering Court One fans applauded politely in temperatures soaring into the 30s Celsius again.
Sania Mirza's brilliant run at the WTA Japan Open ended with a crushing 2-6, 1-6 mauling in the semi-final against world number 26 and fourth seed Francesca Schiavone in Osaka, on Saturday. Sania's defeat meant that the Indian has now lost all three encounters against her Italian friend.
The Indian tennis ace made the grade after Argentina's Marian Bartoli conceded their quarter-final when trailing 4-6, 0-2 in Osaka on Friday.
Sania Mirza crashed out of the women's doubles after losing a thriller but Mahesh Bhupathi advanced to the second round of the mixed doubles at the US Open in New York. Fourteenth seeds Sania and Francesca Schiavone of Italy made a smart recovery from a set down but failed to deliver at crucial points in the decider to lose 2-6, 6-1, 5-7 against the unseeded duo of Gisela Dulko of Argentina and Shahar Peer of Israel in a 125-minute second round match.
Sania Mirza and her Italian partner Francesca Schiavone crashed out of the doubles event of the US$ two million Cincinnati Open following a straight sets defeat against top seeds Cara Black and Liezel Huber. The unseeded Indo-Italian pair lost 4-6, 3-6 to the Zimbabwean-American combination in one hour and 14 minutes in the second round of the WTA event.
World number three Venus Williams followed her sister Serena out of the Madrid Open Tuesday when she was beaten 6-3 3-6 7-5 by unseeded Russian teen-ager Alisa Kleybanova in the second round.
World number two Serena Williams retired from her first-round match against Francesca Schiavone at the Madrid Open Monday with a knee injury after losing the first set to the Italian.
Italy overthrew champions Russia 4-1 on Sunday to book a Fed Cup final meeting with the United States, who staged a stunning comeback to grab a 3-2 win in the Czech Republic.
Italy overthrew champions Russia 4-1 on Sunday to book a Fed Cup final meeting with the United States, who staged a stunning comeback to grab a 3-2 win in the Czech Republic. Francesca Schiavone beat Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova 7-6, 4-6, 6-2 to seal victory in the fourth rubber of the semi-final for 2006 winners Italy, who were at home on clay at Castellaneta Marina.
Flavia Pennetta and Francesca Schiavone gave Italy a shock 2-0 lead over champions Russia, while the United States and the Czech Republic were level at 1-1 after day one in the Fed Cup semi-finals on Saturday. Pennetta swept past an out-of-sorts Anna Chakvetadze 6-4, 6-0 in windy conditions at Castellaneta Marina before Schiavone fought back to beat Svetlana Kuznetsova 1-6, 6-2, 6-3.
Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis advanced to the second round of the Wimbledon Championships, defeating the duo of Saisai Zheng and Zarina Diyas in the opening round on Wednesday night. The top seeded Indo-Swiss pair defeated the Chinese-Kazakh team 6-2, 6-2.
According to Hola magazine, Nadal and Xisca got secretly engaged in May last year and now planning an autumn wedding this year.
Svetlana Kuznetsova reached the final of the Dubai Championships by beating Serbian fourth seed Jelena Jankovic 5-7, 6-4, 6-3.
Anabel Medina Garrigues and Virginia Ruano Pascual claimed the women's doubles crown at the French Open.
Venus Williams remained on course for a strong end to an inconsistent season when the American beat Italy's Francesca Schiavone 6-3, 6-3 to reach the Zurich Open semi-finals on Friday. Third-seeded Williams will face Serbian second seed Ana Ivanovic on Saturday after the world number four saw off Czech qualifier Petra Kvitova 6-1, 6-4.
A livid French team were preparing to launch an official protest after Italy grabbed a 2-0 lead on the opening day of their Fed Cup first round tie on Saturday. A chilly Moscow proved an inhospitable place for China as they went 2-0 down to champions Russia.
Svetlana Kuznetsova and Anna Chakvetadze recorded contrasting victories against Italian opponents in Moscow.
They beat wild cards Svetlana Kuznetsova and Amelie Mauresmo 6-4, 6-4 in the first round at the Dubai Open.
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