Kvitova, Safarova advance to Rogers Cup quarterfinal

Montreal, Canada (4E Sports) – Fifth seed Petra Kvitova of Czech Republic defeated France’s Marion Bartoli, 6-1, 6-1, Friday to advance to the quarterfinal round of the Rogers Cup.

Also joining Kvitova in the last eight is compatriot Lucie Safarova, who ousted fourth seed Australian Samantha Stosur, 7-6 (9), 7-6 (5) in the tournament that offers $360,000 to the singles champion.

The 16th seed Safarova, who is eyeing her second singles title this season, will face the winner of the Angelique Kerber-Roberta Vinci third round match while Kvitova will challenge the winner of the Tamir Paszek-Carla Suarez Navarro encounter.

Thursday’s action was delayed by rain and Kerber and defending champion Caroline Wozniacki had to wait a day to wrap up their second-round victories.

The sixth-seeded Kerber defeated Ekaterina Makarova of Russia, 6-3, 6-3 to record her WTA-leading 49th match win of a breakthrough season.

The No.7-seeded Wozniacki had rallied from a break down to take the first set against and was leading, 7-5, 4-0, when play was called. Upon resumption, she completed her victory over the Dutch qualifier, 7-5, 6-1.

Meanwhile, top seed Victoria Azarenka retired from her match against Paszek before resumption with a left knee injury. Azarenka was locked in a 3-3 score in the first set when play was called.

“There are a few reasons,” said Azarenka, who won the bronze medal in singles plus gold in mixed doubles alongside countryman Max Mirnyi at the London Olympics.

“The last week took so much energy out of me that I had absolutely no time to recover, and my body is feeling it. It was a little bit too quick of a transition for me to come and start the training, and I felt my knee just wasn’t in good shape,” she added.

---

---