By Jack Massey
Dinara Safina, the Russian fourth seed, breezed into the quarter-finals of the Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo today.
Safina, the Beijing Olympic silver medallist, triumphed 6-3, 6-4 over Slovakian Dominika Cibulkova despite hitting eight double faults.
Cibulkova put up a fight by breaking back once in the second set, but Safina secured the first quarter-final spot with a 95 minute victory.
Meanwhile, in the first round, Russian star and fifth seed Svetlana Kuznetsova defeated Beijing Olympic semi-finalist Li Na 6-2, 1-6, 6-3. She avenged her loss to the Chinese star in the second round of the Olympics, with the help of a raft of double faults.
“I'm very happy with the result, especially since I was not expecting to play that well. I didn't play that well in the second set, but the match was good,” said Kuznetsova, the World No.7.
In other first round results, Slovenia's Katarina Srebotnik had an easy victory over Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark 6-1, 6-2, while Russia's Nadia Petrova defeated Aravane Rezai of France 7-5 6-2.
Local hope veteran Ai Sugiyama also lost, being outclassed 6-3, 6-2 by Frenchwoman Virginie Razzano.