Zvonareva ousts eighth-seeded Schiavone in Linz

Vera Zvonareva rallied to beat eighth-seeded Francesca Schiavone of Italy 5-7, 6-1, 6-3 Tuesday in the first round of the Generali Ladies.

Photo: Zvonareva ousts eighth-seeded Schiavone in Linz

The Russian improved to 5-0 against the 14th-ranked Schiavone, who was hampered by the right calf injury that forced her to pull out of the Zurich Open last week.

Zvonareva next faces Mary Pierce of France, who beat Ai Sugiyama of Japan 7-6 (3), 7-6 (5).

Both players broke the other's serve six times in the match. Pierce broke Sugiyama twice as the Japanese was serving for the first set. Sugiyama returned the favor in the second, rallying from a 3-0 deficit and pulling even as Pierce was serving for the match at 5-4.

Seventh-seeded Anna Chakvetadze of Russia reached the second round by beating Katarina Srebotnik of Slovenia 7-5, 6-2. After taking a 4-2 lead in the first set, Srebotnik, a semifinalist in Zurich last week, won just three more games.

Nathalie Dechy beat 15-year-old Austrian wild card Tamira Paszek 2-6, 6-3, 6-1. Paszek won the first set in just over 20 minutes, but sought treatment for a pulled muscle in her right leg and never recovered her form, reports AP.

In other matches, Mara Santangelo of Italy downed Ukrainian qualifier Alona Bondarenko 6-4, 1-6, 6-3, and 17-year-old Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland defeated Anna-Lena Groenefeld of Germany 6-4, 7-5.