Tennis

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Anna Chakvetadze won her second consecutive tournament, making quick work of surprise finalist Sania Mirza and taking the Bank of the West Classic 6-3, 6-2 on Sunday.

"I'm pleased with the way I played and happy I won," Chakvetadze said. "I didn't serve that well the whole week but I played well. I had to concentrate more on every point."

She improved to 6-0 in tournament finals and will rise to No. 6 in the world rankings. The unseeded Mirza will return to her previous career high of No. 31 when the new rankings come out.

"It means a lot," said Chakvetadze, the top seed. "It means I know I can do it and that I have to work harder to get (to the top five) and be more consistent."

For Mirza it means her goal of reaching the top 20 is becoming clearer.

"I've always said I could be top 20 and I believe in that," she said. "I thought maybe by the end of next season, but who knows? Maybe it will happen this year. I believe in setting realistic, practical goals."

Both players went three sets in winning semifinal matches on Saturday, and both went to play doubles competition.

"I have to say I'm a little tired," said Chakvetadze, who earned $88,265 for the victory. "I wasn't feeling that great to run around for three sets so I told myself to finish it fast."

Chakvetadze has won nine straight matches, and 20 off 22 overall. Her only losses since the beginning of May have been in the French Open and Wimbledon.

In the second game of the first set, Chakvetadze caught her braided pony tail in her racket and was unable to play a ball. She was able to laugh it off.

"I used to have even longer hair than I have now and that has never happened," she said.

She has no plans to change her hairstyle, nor does she want to change her schedule. After playing in the doubles final she heads straight to San Diego to play singles and doubles beginning Monday.

"I just won't have a lot of time to celebrate," she said.

Mirza, who will also compete in San Diego, said she had a great week despite losing in the final.

"I learned I can play good tennis the whole week," said Mirza, who had a large following at the match. "Physically I couldn't take it like she can."

Mirza said Chakvetadze just wore her down.

"In the first set I was there for the most part and I had a couple of chances to come back," she said. "After I lost the first set she dominated. She comes up with her best in the finals. I wasn't feeling it as well as I have this week. I wasn't hitting the ball as cleanly."

Chakvetadze improved to 21-4 on hardcourt (46-11 overall), while Mirza fell to 14-5 (20-12) on the surface.

This is the first time since March of 2003 that the two singles finalists also played in the doubles final.

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Sergio Roitman upset third-seeded Juan Ignacio Chela in straight sets Tuesday in the first round of the Orange Prokom Open, and Austria's Stefan Koubek rallied past fifth-seeded Agustin Calleri.

Roitman beat Chela 6-1, 6-2 in the all-Argentine match on clay. Koubek recovered to defeat Calleri 0-6, 7-6 (3), 7-5.

Chela and Calleri joined No. 4 Filippo Volandri and No. 6 Nicolas Almagro, who were eliminated in first-round matches Monday. No. 8 Potito Starace of Italy also went out Tuesday, retiring in the third set against Boris Pashanski of Serbia, who led 6-7 (4), 6-2, 3-1.

Second-seeded Tommy Robredo nearly added to the first-round victims list. Poland's Lukasz Kubot rallied from a 4-1 deficit to tie the third set against Robredo 5-5, before the Spaniard prevailed 6-4, 5-7, 7-5.

Two seeds did advance Tuesday, led by No. 1 Nikolay Davydenko of Russia, who beat Romania's Andrei Pavel 6-3, 6-4. He moved on along with No. 7 Florian Mayer of Germany, who defeated Juan Pablo Brzezicki of Argentina 6-3, 6-3.

Igor Andreev of Russia completed a 6-0, 6-4 victory over Nicolas Lapentti of Ecuador in a match that was suspended Monday because of rain.

Olivier Patience of France beat Dawid Olejniczak of Poland 7-6 (0), 6-4; Martin Vassallo Arguello defeated Maximo Gonzales 2-6, 6-3, 6-2 in another all-Argentine match; and Belgium's Kristof Vliegen defeated Luis Horna of Peru 6-2, 6-7 (, 6-3.

Gilles Simon of France stopped Viktor Troicki from Serbia 6-0, 7-6 (6), and Belgium's Steve Darcis ousted Nicolas Massu of Chile 6-7 (, 7-6 (0),6-4.

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Lindsay Davenport will return to singles for the first time in a year at a September tournament in Bali, with plans for a limited schedule in 2008 leading to the Olympics.

Davenport, who gave birth to a son in June, is scheduled to play Sept. 10, organizers of the Wismilak International said Tuesday.

Davenport, a former No. 1 player, recently announced she would play doubles with Lisa Raymond at the Pilot Pen tournament in New Haven, Conn., in August. She has not competed on the WTA Tour since reaching the Beijing quarterfinals in September 2006.

Davenport probably will play more singles events this fall after Bali and enter several bigger tournaments next year, said her agent, Tony Godsick. The plan is to stick to a limited schedule in 2008 and focus on the Beijing Games, he said.

Davenport has won three Grand Slams and a gold medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. She captured the Wismilak title in 2005.

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Sania Mirza used pressure at the net in the third set to pull off a 6-3, 4-6, 6-2 upset of No. 12 seed Shahar Peer Tuesday in the Acura Classic.

Mirza, a finalist at Stanford on Sunday, beat her doubles partner by going to the net more often than usual in the final set, trying to shorten rallies. The strategy paid off for Mirza, who said she was tired from playing all week at the Bank of the West Classic.

"I really didn't want to spend so much time on the court," said Mirza, who lost in straights sets at Stanford to Anna Chakvetadze. "We all know that (Peer) is one of the best on the Tour at running down shots. If I keep hitting and ripping from behind the baseline, she's going to keep tracking down balls."

Mirza instead decided uncharacteristically to come to the net in the third set against her Israeli opponent. It worked as Mirza jumped out to a 4-1 lead.

Fourth-seeded Nadia Petrova of Russia advanced with a 6-3, 7-5 second-round victory over countrywoman Elena Bovina.

"She is not an easy player to play in the first round," Petrova said. "But overall, I'm happy on what I did on the court today."

No. 5 Marion Bartoli of France struggled in her second-round match before defeating Japan's Aiko Nakamura, 7-6 (4), 6-1. Bartoli was the runner-up to Venus Williams at Wimbledon.

In other first-round matches involving ranked players, No. 15 seed Sybille Bammer of Austria was a 6-4, 7-6 (5) winner over Kateryna Bondarenko of the Ukraine, and 16th-seeded Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic defeated Meilen Tu of the United States, 6-4, 6-3.

Mirza, who equaled her career high ranking of No. 31 this week after her runner-up finish at Stanford, broke Peer's serve nine times.

"I'm happy because it was a very tough first-round match," Mirza said. "But we both are not happy because we are friends, and it's hard to play a friend."

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Andy Roddick advanced to the third round of the Legg Mason Tennis Classic, beating Tomas Zib 6-4, 6-2 Tuesday night.

It was the first match for Roddick, a two-time winner of the event and this year's No. 1 seed, since losing to Frank Dancevic in the semifinals last week in Indianapolis. Roddick said Monday he was slowed in the match in part because of an upset stomach brought on by a late-night fast food meal.

But Roddick looked healthy enough against Zib. He broke serve to take a 5-3 lead in the first set, which he finished off two games later with an emphatic ace that came after he saved two break points.

Roddick took control of the second set by breaking Zib at love to take a 2-1 lead. In the third round Roddick will face either 15th-seeded Radek Stepanek or Rockville, Md., native Paul Goldstein, who reached the second round Tuesday by beating Somdev Dev Varman 6-4, 6-2.

Also reaching the third round was fifth-seeded Hyung-Taik Lee, who beat Russia's Igor Kunitsyn 6-7 (7), 6-3, 6-1. The No. 9 seed, Gael Monfils of France, beat Martin Klizan 7-6 (5), 6-4.

In a first round match, Tim Henman double-faulted on match point in a third-set tiebreaker to hand American John Isner a 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 (4) win in just his second ATP tour event.

Isner used a serve that routinely topped 130 mph to beat the tournament's 2003 champion.

"I might have caught him on an off day," said Isner, who was part of the University of Georgia's NCAA championship team in May. "Beating somebody of his caliber in a tournament like this has got to be up there. I would put it right behind winning that team championship."

Henman looked like he was in control after a first set in which he lost only four points on his serve. But Isner broke Henman to end the second set and forced Henman to save two match points serving at 4-5 in the third.

"He's a great server. He came up with two, probably the biggest serves of the match, down 15-40," Isner said. "I served really, really well in the tiebreaker."

Isner, who will play Germany's Benjamin Becker in the second round, had three of his 18 aces in the tiebreaker.

In other first round action, South Africa's Wesley Moodie beat American Ryan Sweeting 6-3, 6-4 and Wesley Whitehouse, also of South Africa, beat Jiri Vanek 3-6, 6-3, 6-3. Germany's Michael Berrer beat George Bastl 6-3, 6-2 and American Wayne Odesnik beat Adrian Garcia 4-6, 6-3, 6-0.

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"انوشا شاهقلي" روز دوشنبه با پيروزي مقابل "شهاب حسني" به دور دوم پيكارهاي تنيس جايزه بزرگ اروميه راه يافت.

در اين دوره از مسابقه*ها كه با حضور ۲۴تنيس*باز در مجموعه ورزشي تختي اروميه برگزار مي*شود، شاهقلي با نتيجه ۲بر صفر حريف خود را شكست داد و به مرحله بعدي صعود كرد.

در ساير ديدارها نتايج زير بدست آمد:

سعيد احمدوند ۲امير مهذب نيا صفر
مهدي اهتمايي ۲مهدي حمايتكار صفر
اميد سوري ۲حسين فروزان صفر
فرهاد صانع ۲البرز اخوان صفر
محسن حسين زاده ۲طيب مرادي ۱
حميد اكبري ۲سامان كوهستاني صفر
اشكان شكوفي ۲سهند اسماعيلي صفر
روزبه كامران ۲كيارش سوري صفر
گوهر گيز ۲بابك نظمي ۱
در پايان اين دوره از مسابقه*ها به نفرات اول و دوم به ترتيب ۱۵و هفت و نيم ميليون ريال و به نفرات سوم مشترك دو ميليون و پانصد هزار ريال جايزه نقدي اهدا خواهد شد.

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Second-seeded Tommy Robredo defeated Jose Acasuso 7-5, 6-0 Sunday to win the Prokom Open.

The 25-year-old Spaniard won his first career title at the clay-court event in 2001. He captured his fifth title with Sunday's win.

"Winning two times at the same place, it means that I like this place," Robredo said.

The players traded breaks early in the first set before Acasuso broke again to lead 4-2. But Robredo hit a sliding backhand volley to break back and then level 4-4 on serve.

Robredo saved two set points serving at 4-5. Then at 5-5, Acasuso pushed a forehand long and Robredo clipped the line with a forehand winner to break and serve for the set.

Acasuso threw up his hands in frustration after knocking a slam long to give Robredo a break to open the second set. The Argentine struggled the rest of the way from the baseline and consistently netted volleys or pushed them wide.

Robredo, ranked No. 7 in the world, said the victory gave him confidence after inconsistent play earlier this year.

"It's great always to win a title, this week especially because it has been one year without a title, since Bastad last year," he said. "In the last couple of weeks I wasn't playing so good, and this week I had to fight so much."

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Who hits the ball hardest in women's tennis? The WTA Tour is introducing a statistic to measure that.

Six-time Grand Slam champion Venus Williams ranked No. 1 in the new "power index" during last week's Acura Classic, averaging 94.5 mph on her hardest shots.

The index takes into account a player's fastest groundstroke (forehand or backhand), first serve, second serve, first-serve return, second-serve return and smash or volley.

It uses ball-tracking technology from Hawk-Eye Innovations, the company involved in instant replay in tennis, and measures players in center-court matches.

"Other leading professional sports have introduced new methods to measure and compare the performance of their players to provide another level of insight for fans," tour president Stacy Allaster said Monday. "The power index affords that same opportunity for women's tennis."

The statistic made its debut at the Acura Classic, with Maria ***ilenko finishing second to Williams at 92.7 mph. Victoria Azarenka was third at 92.3 mph, followed by tournament champion Maria Sharapova at 90.5 mph.

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Top-seeded Maria Sharapova earned her first title in 10 months with a 6-2, 3-6, 6-0 victory Sunday over Patty Schnyder in the final Acura Classic tournament.

Sharapova used sharp groundstrokes in the first and third sets to capture her first championship since winning a WTA title at Linz, Austria, in October.

The No. 2 ranked player, who was the defending champion, dropped her first set of the tournament that had a 24-year run in the San Diego-area. Promoters sold the tournament rights back to the WTA Tour, which plans to relocate the event.

"It's always good to win a title," Sharapova said. "But to actually come back the year after and back it up is good."

Schnyder, the No. 11 seed, had no answers for Sharapova in the first set as her Russian opponent consistently hit the lines with forehands and backhands.

"In the first set, I felt like I hit some really good shots, especially when she was serving," Sharapova said. "It opened some doors for me."

But the Swiss woman settled down in the second set and earned her first break of serve to take a 3-1 lead. Sharapova broke right back, but Schnyder eventually broke again for a 5-3 lead. The left-hander took the second set when Sharapova hit a forehand long.

The third set was a repeat of the first as Sharapova began hitting crisp winners again. Sharapova jumped out to a 4-0 lead after breaking Schnyder in the second and fourth games. She finished off the match with a crosscourt forehand winner.

"The beginning of the third she tried to be more aggressive," Schnyder said. "The first break I got, she hit three returns on the line, two on the baseline that were impossible to handle. She went for those shots and she got it. She really deserved to win."

Schnyder had little success against Sharapova's serve, going 2-for-10 in break chances. Sharapova was successful on 6 of 10 break opportunities.

"She's a champion and you know you have to come up with something special," Schnyder said.

Sharapova, a Wimbledon and U.S. Open singles champion, received $181,980 for her 16th tour title. Schnyder received $92,410.

The win raised Sharapova's career record to 6-1 against Schnyder with five of the matches going to three sets.

Schnyder, who beat three straight higher-ranked opponents to reach the finals, hasn't won a title since July 2005.

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Andy Roddick wasn't about to let John Isner have another chance at a third-set tiebreaker, much less let the unseeded American win the first title of his career.

Instead, Roddick put a stop to Isner's dream week, beating him 6-4, 7-6 (4) Sunday to win his third Legg Mason Tennis Classic title.

Roddick, who also won here in 2001 and 2005, earned his 23rd ATP title by solving Isner's serve, which had carried him to five straight wins in third-set tiebreakers.

"I knew I had to win the second-set tiebreaker because I thought I had no chance in the third-set tiebreaker against him," Roddick joked. "I was fortunate to be able to hold my own serve because it was just one point. ... I was happy with the way I controlled the match with my serve."

It was the second straight day Roddick had to face a powerful serve from a taller player. The 6-foot-9 Isner had 12 aces against Roddick, seven fewer than 6-10 Ivo Karlovic had against Roddick in the semifinals.

Coming into the final, Isner had spent nearly six hours more on the court this week than Roddick, and that appeared to catch up with him.

"I didn't really have that much left in my tank, playing so many matches," Isner said. "But even on a full tank, I probably would have come up a little short."

Roddick broke Isner at-love to take a 4-3 lead and eventually win the first set.

Serving in the second set at 4-all, Isner hit an overhead into the bottom of the net from just inches away, costing him the first point of a game that he went on to win after saving two break points.

"I don't know what I was doing," Isner said. "It's impossible to do that, but I managed to do it. Thank God I won that game and didn't lose 4-and-4 knowing that I missed the easiest overhead in history."

The only point Isner lost on his serve in the tiebreaker was when a backhand half-volley went long to give Roddick a 3-1 lead. Roddick hit a crosscourt forehand to close out the match and earn $74,250.

Isner finished the tournament 7-4 in tiebreakers, including his wins over Tim Henman, Benjamin Becker, Wayne Odesnik, Tommy Haas and Gael Monfils.

Isner only had one break-point chance in the match, with Roddick serving at 1-2 in first set. However, Roddick came up with a forehand winner and later held for 2-all.

Despite the loss Sunday, a lot has changed in a week for Isner. In addition to taking home $43,700 in prize money, he will jump from No. 416 to inside the top 200 in next week's rankings and has been granted a wild card into Cincinnati in two weeks.

"I told him, this is a start," Roddick said. "You have great momentum, great confidence, people are going to respect you a lot more, but this is the beginning. I told him at the net to keep going."

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Qualifier Robin Haase upset 10th-seeded Tomas Berdych 6-4, 7-5 Monday in the rain-delayed first round of the Rogers Cup.

Lleyton Hewitt beat Juan Carlos Ferrero 7-6 (5), 6-4 in a matchup of former top-ranked players. Ferrero is ranked 17th in the world and Hewitt is 21st.

"My main focus is on the U.S. Open, more than the ranking situation," Hewitt said. "I feel like I'm a lot better player than where my ranking is sitting at. I'd like to say I'm a dangerous floater now."

The 2001 U.S. Open champion and 2002 Wimbledon winner won his 26th career title this year at Las Vegas, but has not played in nearly two months while recovering from a back injury.

Haase, ranked 103rd, broke serve for a 6-5 lead in the second set and served out the match for his first career win against a top-10 opponent. He'll next face Marcos Baghdatis or Carlos Moya.

"To beat a player with the name Berdych is unbelievable," Hasse said. "It's my best win, for sure. "Last week in Washington, I could have won against (Russian) Marat Safin too. I had chances, so I knew I could bring up my level."

Berdych reached the quarterfinals at last year's Rogers Cup, where he upset Rafael Nadal.

Argentina's David Nalbandian ousted Alejandro Falla of Colombia 6-4, 6-3 and next will face 16th-seeded David Ferrer of Spain, who beat Ernests Gulbis of Latvia 6-2, 6-1.

Stanislas Wawrinka of Switzerland downed Lee Hyung-Taik of South Korea 6-3, 3-6, 6-3.

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Nikolay Davydenko will play in the Rogers Cup tennis tournament this week amid an investigation into irregular betting patterns on one of his matches.

The Association of Tennis Professionals said Monday it had no plans to suspend the Russian star or ask him to sit out.

"It is important that we not jump to conclusions, especially when players' reputations could be unfairly tainted," ATP executive chairman Etienne de Villiers said. "What we must do is carry out a comprehensive and immediate investigation and that is what we are doing."

Davydenko is seeded fourth at the Rogers Cup and won't play until the second round on Wednesday.

The ATP is looking into Davydenko's match against Martin Vassallo Arguello at the Prokom Open in Sopot last week.

In an unprecedented move, British online gambling company Betfair voided all bets on the match when it drew about $7 million in wagers, about 10 times the usual amount for a similar match. Most of the money was on Arguello to win, even after Davydenko won the first set 6-2.

The bookmaker has an agreement with the ATP to report any irregular betting.

"With regards to the recent match involving Nikolay Davydenko and Martin Vassallo Arguello, we have instigated a full ATP investigation and we will be using all means available to us -- including independent, external resources -- via our anti-corruption rules to conduct a complete and thorough investigation," de Villiers said.

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Bud Collins joined ESPN's tennis coverage a month after his final Wimbledon appearance for NBC.

The 78-year-old tennis analyst, known for his colorful outfits and creative nicknames for players, will participate in ESPN2's coverage of the Australian Open, the French Open and Wimbledon in 2008. He will report for SportsCenter, ESPNEWS and ESPN Radio from the U.S. Open starting this month.

NBC declined to renew Collins' contract after 35 years with the network. He was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1994.

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Elena Dementieva opened defense of her EastWest Bank Classic title with a 6-3, 6-1 victory over Ekaterina Makarova on Tuesday.

"I think it was a good start," Dementieva said after the first-round match. "I never played against her (Makarova) and didn't know what to expect. We had a really big fight in the first set, but I easily won the second one and it's good to get some energy for (Wednesday)."

Dementieva, who beat Jelena Jankovic in last year's final, came into this event after reaching the semifinals last week at the Acura Classic. The 25-year-old Russian is seeded only ninth because a nine-week layoff due to a right rib stress fracture dropped her out of the top 10 in the WTA Tour rankings.

She was No. 8 before she got hurt in mid-February and No. 13 this week. But she said she has fully recovered and is now focusing on this month's U.S. Open.

"I think it's about getting your confidence back, playing as many matches as I can before the U.S. Open, to get the good level of the game for the big events," Dementieva said. "I'm just happy it's not bothering me anymore and just looking forward to finding the rhythm of the game and playing better."

Dementieva, who won her seventh career title earlier this year, said it was a "special feeling" to be back as a defending champion. It's no benefit from a competitive standpoint, though, because she could face No. 5 Daniela Hantuchova in the third round and top seed Maria Sharapova in the quarterfinals.

No. 8 seed Dinara Safina made an unexpected exit, losing to Kateryna Bondarenko, 6-2, 7-5, in a second-round match. Safina had been a potential quarterfinal opponent for Jankovic.

Michaella Krajicek moved into the third round with a 6-4, 6-3 win over Yuliana Fedak, and will face the winner of Wednesday's Sharapova-Eleni Daniilidou match.

No. 10 seed Shahar Peer and No. 15 Katarina Srebotnik both advanced to the second round with straight set wins, as did Shaui Peng, Victoria Azarenka, Mara Santangelo and Lilia Osterloh.

Ai Sugiyama needed three sets to turn aside Camille Pin, 5-7, 6-3, 6-3, and Daniilidou went three before claiming a 3-6, 6-2, 6-1 win over Arevane Rezai.

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Third-seeded Novak Djokovic defeated Nicolas Kiefer 6-3, 6-3 Tuesday to advance to the third round of the Rogers Cup.

"At the start of the match, I didn't put a lot of first serves in and he tried to go to the net right away, be aggressive," Djokovic said. "That was his style, but I managed to hold, stay focused and get it over in straight sets."

James Blake held off Jurgen Melzer 7-5, 7-6 (4) in a match that featured only one service break. Blake did not have to defend a single break point in the match, while Melzer fended off 13 of Blake's 14 break points.

He will face Lleyton Hewitt in the second round.

"I haven't seen too many matches where you look through and you see a sure win for anyone," Blake said. "It's a great testament to the depth of men's tennis, how good these guys really are."

Andy Murray, playing his first tournament since a right wrist injury sidelined him in May, defeated Robby Ginepri 6-4, 6-4.

Marat Safin advanced when Robin Soderling retired leading 2-1 in the first set. He will face second-seeded Spaniard Rafael Nadal for the first time in his career in the second round.

"What do I have to lose?" Safin said. "I'm not going to tank the match, I'm going to try to win it, of course. But I'm definitely not expecting anything great out of it."

Sixth-seeded Fernando Gonzalez of Chile was upset by Radek Stepanek of the Czech Republic 6-7 (2), 7-6 (1), 6-4.

Tommy Haas advanced with a 6-3, 7-6 (6) win over Agustin Calleri. Haas had 11 of the 24 aces in the match.

Jarkko Nieminen won 6-3, 6-4 over Julien Benneteau, and Ivo Karlovic eliminated Max Mirnyi of Belarus 4-6, 6-3, 7-6 (3).