Maria Sharapova ousts fellow Russian Elena Vesnina

American advances at the Australian Open

Tournament favourite Williams appeared to hurt ankle

Serena Williams continued her good run of form against Maria Sharapova, beating the Russian in straight sets to win the final of the WTA Championships in Istanbul.

Sara Errani arrived at the French Open having won just one match in her five previous appearances here and having never beaten a top-10 player in 28 attempts. Tomorrow she will play in her first Grand Slam final thanks to a 7-5, 1-6, 6-3 victory over the world No 6, Sam Stosur, who yesterday became the 24-year-old Italian's third successive top-10 victim.

She is No 2 in the world and played in two Grand Slam finals last year but Vera Zvonareva could still walk down most streets unnoticed. The 26-year-old Russian was beaten by Kim Clijsters in the final here 12 months ago and is already through to this week's quarter-finals thanks to a comfortable 6-2, 6-3 victory over Germany's Sabine Lisicki on Sunday night.

Defending champion Serena Williams proceeded to the third round yesterday, but was still a long way from her formidable best, dropping the first set against the Romanian Simona Halep. There was no weeping when she finally prevailed 3-6, 6-2, 6-1, as there had been after her first-round victory, but her father Richard was eager to cast some perspective on her progress. Following the emergency surgery earlier this year to remove a blood clot in her lungs, he said that "whether she ever wins again or loses every match she plays, I'm just thanking God that she is alive".

Kim Clijsters, the favourite to win the women's singles title here at the Australian Open, has a chance tomorrow to erase the memory of her biggest defeat in a Grand Slam tournament. For the second year in succession the 27-year-old Belgian faces a third-round meeting with Russia's Nadia Petrova, who 12 months ago crushed her 6-0, 6-1.

Serbia’s men hold the Davis Cup and it was not so long ago that their women were also threatening to rule the world. Ana Ivanovic, French Open champion in 2008 and three times a Grand Slam finalist, and Jelena Jankovic, beaten in the US Open final the same year, both had spells on top of the world rankings. After two rounds of this year’s Australian Open, however, both are on their way home.

The contrasting directions in the careers of "Aussie Kim" and "Aussie Ana", two of the crowd favourites at the Australian Open, were underlined by their performances here yesterday.

The careers of Justine Henin and Kim Clijsters have followed intertwining paths ever since the two Belgians first faced one another, aged nine and eight, in a junior tournament in Ostend.

There were times yesterday when Justine Henin might have cast her mind back three years to her last appearance at the All England Club. The then world No 1 was an overwhelming favourite to win her 2007 semi-final against Marion Bartoli, particularly after coasting through the first set in 22 minutes and breaking serve in the opening game of the second, but melted as quickly as a Belgian chocolate in the Centre Court sunshine. Henin's defeat was one of the most remarkable results in Wimbledon history and her only loss in a 42-match sequence from the start of the French Open to the end of the 2007 season.

Andy Murray has been insisting that he has not been concerned by his lack of victories on clay this season and the Scot showed at the Madrid Masters last night that there is little wrong with his current form. Murray recorded only his second win of the clay-court season when he beat Argentina's Juan Ignacio Chela 6-3, 6-3. He now plays Romania's Victor Hanescu in the third round.