Mauresmo advances at Australian Open

MELBOURNE, Australia — Second-ranked Amelie Mauresmo kept her composure while teenager Ana Ivanovic lost hers Friday, advancing to the fourth round of the Australian Open with 6-2, 7-5 victory.

The 17-year-old Ivanovic broke Mauresmo's serve twice in the second set, but dropped her next two service games. After having game point to force a second-set tiebreaker, Ivanovic struggled to combat Mauresmo's slice backhand and made a string of errors, surrendering the match.

Mauresmo rose to the No. 1 ranking last September before slipping behind Lindsay Davenport. Ivanovic made the biggest leap in the rankings on the WTA Tour in 2004, moving 608 spots to finish at No. 97.

The 25-year-old Mauresmo, a finalist here in 1999, said Friday's third-round win was part of her progression to, "hopefully," her first major title.

"It's a long way still, three matches down, four to go and some good players still in the field," she said. "I'm happy with how things are going — it's the first time that I got into a Grand Slam with this ranking.

"I'm enjoying it. Hopefully, I get closer and closer to the No. 1 spot."

She next faces Evgenia Linetskaya, a 6-3, 6-4 winner over American Amy Frazier, seeded 21st.

Ivanovic, who won her first WTA Tour title in Canberra last week, hit 20 of her 34 unforced errors in the second set, and made a double-faults in the sixth and eighth games to either give Mauresmo break points or the game.

In other matches, 15th-seeded Silvia Farina Elia cruised past British qualifier Elena Baltacha 6-1, 6-0 in 56 minutes.

Later Friday, top-ranked Roger Federer goes for his career-best 24th straight win against Jarkko Nieminen. Marat Safin, last year's runner-up, faces big-serving Mario Ancic, and four-time winner Andre Agassi faces fellow American Taylor Dent in a night match.

On the women's side, Wimbledon champion Maria Sharapova plays China's Li Na, and seventh-seeded Serena Williams goes against Sania Mirza.

In a much-hyped showdown between the two biggest servers in tennis Thursday, Andy Roddick beat Greg Rusedski 6-0, 3-6, 6-2, 6-3 to reach the third round.

The second-seeded Roddick owns the record for fastest serve, at 155 mph, but the big difference in the match was Roddick's returns. He hit winners with almost as much speed as they had coming off Rusedski's racket.