Dokic wins at Pan Pacific Open, Davenport advances

Agence France-Presse, Tokyo

Yugoslavia's Jelena Dokic, playing her season-opener after skipping the Australian Open, got her year off to a winning start with a 7-6 (7/4), 6-4 victory over rising Indonesian star Angelique Widjaja at the Pan Pacific Open tennis tournament on Thursday.

The second-seeded Dokic, ranked eighth in the world, started slowly, going down 0-5 in the first set, before storming back to win the second round match in 80 minutes.

Third seed Lindsay Davenport of the United States joined Dokic in the quarter-finals with a 6-4, 6-4 victory over 1996 Pan Pacific champion Iva Majoli of Croatia.

Dokic will play American Lisa Raymond, a 2-6, 7-6 (9/7), 6-2 winner over Magdalena Maleeva of Bulgaria, while Davenport will take on Thai ace Tamarine Tanasugarn.

Tamarine survived a 141-minute battle against sixth seed Silvia Farina Elia of Italy, winning 6-7 (4/7), 7-5, 6-1.

In other action, Sydney Olympic silver medalist Elena Dementieva of Russia, the eighth seed, breezed past French qualifier Stephanie Cohen Aloro 6-2, 6-2 and Lina Krasnoroutskaya became the only qualifier to reach the last eight with a marathon 6-7 (10/12), 7-6 (9/7), 6-2 win over fellow Russian Elena Bovina.

Krasnoroutskaya will play top seed Monica Seles of the United States in the quarterfinals.

"It's my first match and everyone else had a few matches, so it's a bit more difficult for me," said Dokic, who emigrated to Australia from Serbia in 1994 but has skipped the Australian Open for the past two years because of a stormy relationship with the Australian media and tennis authorities.

"And it's a different surface, a little bit harder to get used to," she said. "But I don't mind starting (the season) in this tournament ... I'd like to start in this tournament."

Last year, the 19-year-old Dokic also began her season in the 1.3-million-dollar event and crashed out in her first match.

"I think 5-love was similar to last year," she said. "It was difficult to get used to. I haven't played on the court for three or four months, I hadn't played a match, so I think it was pretty much the same.

"It took me awhile to start, but I think even if I had lost the first set, I would have been able to come back."

Two-time Pan Pacific winner Davenport, who was unable to defend her Tokyo indoor title last year because of a knee injury, said her knee felt fine after surgery.

"It's nice to get the first match out of the way," she said. "My knee is 100 percent. I have not felt one bit of pain since the days of surgery, so my knee is fantastic.

"It's still just trying to get back to the level of tennis I was playing before the knee surgery."

In Milan, Italy, Morocco's Younes El Aynaoui, who lost an epic five-hour, five-set Australian Open quarterfinals last week, surrendered his Milan indoor hopes in tamer fashion here on Wednesday when he was knocked out of the 380,000 euro event in the second round by Italian veteran Andrea Gaudenzi.

The third-seeded El Aynaoui, who also knocked top seed and world number one Lleyton Hewitt out of the opening Grand Slam event of the season in Melbourne before losing that epic last eight clash to Andy Roddick, went down in straight sets 7-5, 6-3.

Earlier, the 1996 Wimbledon champion Richard Krajicek had turned back the clock to dispose of Czech Radek Stepanek 3-6, 6- 3, 7-6 (15/13) in the second round.

Krajicek will meet Jarrko Nieminen in the last eight after the Finnish number eight seed ousted Anthony Dupuis of France 7-6 (7/4), 2-6, 6-4.

Title holder, and local favorite Davide Sanguinetti, sailed through to the next round after beating fellow Italian Giorgio Galimberti 6-2, 6-4 to set up a quarterfinals clash against Belarus' Max Mirnyi.

Martin Verkerk of Holland also progressed to the quarterfinals after securing a 6-3, 6-4 win over Swedish veteran Thomas Enqvist.