Quite a battle

Mauresmo gets past Weingartner in three sets

MELBOURNE (Reuters) -- Seventh seed Amelie Mauresmo overcame tenacious German Marlene Weingartner 6-0, 4-6, 7-5 in a gripping fourth round match to advance into the Australian Open quarterfinals on Monday.

Unseeded Weingartner, who defeated 10th seed Meghann Shaughnessy in the third round, fought back after losing the first set to love in just 19 minutes.

Weingartner slowed the pace down and started hitting delicate chips, moving the ball from side to side and drawing Mauresmo into long rallies rather than trying to match her power.

The tactic unsettled the Frenchwoman and she took the second set 6-4 following a 30 minute rain delay.

But Mauresmo composed herself and gained the upper hand in the decider which she took 7-5.

"I had a very good start in the first set and then maybe I wanted to do too much...and I started to make a few mistakes," a relieved Mauresmo told reporters.

"And then she came back into the match and she started to hit everything...so I had to struggle," she said.

The pair twice swapped service breaks in a tense third set.

Weingartner missed a key opportunity with Mauresmo serving at 4-4. The German was at 15-30 but netted a relatively simple backhand when she had the chance to set up two break points and Mauresmo went on to hold serve.

Weingartner's nerve finally broke and she dropped her serve to love in the 12th and final game.

"I just hung in there and try to break her, try to make her play as much as I could and try not to let her dictate the point," Mauresmo said.

"At some stages it was a little bit difficult for me."

Mauresmo will play top seed and defending champion Jennifer Capriati in the quarterfinals after Capriati later hustled past Italian Rita Grande 6-3, 7-6.

Weingartner, 22, had never before made it past the third round of a grand slam event. As a teenager in 1999, Mauresmo became the first Frenchwoman to reach the final of the Australian Open since 1922 but was beaten by Martina Hingis.

 

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