Tennis: Serena relief at progress

Published on Tuesday 25 May 2010 10:03

SERENA WILLIAMS admitted she was just pleased still to be in the French Open after struggling to shake off Swiss youngster Stefanie Voegele in the first round.

Top seed Williams was given an unexpectedly-tough time by the 20-year-old world No.76, although she has struggled with injury since clinching the Australian Open in January.

And the American certainly did not have things all her own way, particularly in the first set, but she did enough to come through 7-6 (7-2), 6-2.

Williams will face Germany's Julia Goerges in the next round.

Third seed Caroline Wozniacki had no such problems dispatching Alla Kudryavtseva to reach round two, where she will play Tathiana Garbin.

Wozniacki showed no sign of the ankle injury that forced her to retire from the quarter-finals of the Warsaw Open last week in winning 6-0, 6-3.

Day one saw two seeds fall at the first hurdle but there were no more casualties on day two.

The closest to being knocked out were Italian 17th seed Francesca Schiavone and 27th seed Alona Bondarenko.

Both lost the first set against Regina Kulikova and Vera Dushevina before recovering to win 5-7, 6-3, 6-4 and 6-7 (3-7), 6-3, 6-4 respectively.