Venus Williams among Zurich winners

ZURICH, Switzerland, Oct. 15 (UPI) -- This year's Wimbledon champion, Venus Williams, led Wednesday's second-round winners at the Zurich Open tennis tournament in Switzerland.

Williams, the No. 3 seed and former world No. 1, beat Alona Bondarenko of Ukraine 6-3, 6-4.

Her next opponent, Italian Francesca Schiavone, topped Russia's Maria Kirilenko 6-3, 7-5 in Wednesday's nightcap.

The tournament's first round concluded with Italy's Flavia Pennetta pasting Russian Nadia Petrova 6-1, 6-1; Slovenian Katarina Srebotnik beating crowd favorite Timea Bacsinszky of Switzerland 6-3, 6-3; and Sweden's Sofia Arvidsson rallying for a 0-6, 7-5, 6-4 victory against Austrian Sybille Bammer.

In second-round matches Thursday, world No. 1 and French Open champion Jelena Jankovic faces Pennetta; Australian Open runner-up Ana Ivanovic, the second seed, plays unseeded Frenchwoman Marion Bartoli; fourth-seeded Vera Zvonareva meets Spain's Anabel Medina-Garrigues; fifth-seeded Agnieszka Radwandska of Poland plays unseeded Katarina Srebotnik of Slovenia; and in a battle of non-seeds, Arvidsson plays Petra Kvitova of the Czech Republic.