Safina ousted from Dubai tournament

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, Feb. 17 (UPI) -- Second-seeded Dinara Safina was a straight-set upset victim Tuesday in second-round play at the $2 million Dubai Tennis Championships.

Safina had her serve broken four times in a 6-4, 6-2 loss to Virginie Razzano. Safina also had 12 double faults in the brief match.

Top-seeded Serena Williams lost the first four games of her match Tuesday before rallying for a 4-6, 6-2, 6-0 victory over Sara Errani. Williams was on the offense the entire match, as shown by her nine aces -- and seven double faults -- and forcing Errani into 14 break-point situations, of which Williams cashed in eight.

Also Tuesday, third-seeded Jelena Jankovic was a 6-3, 6-2 winner over Monica Niculescu; fourth-seeded Elena Dementieva defeated Sybille Bammer, 7-5, 6-2; No. 5-seeded Vera Zvonareva breezed past Vera Dushevina, 6-0, 6-3; and sixth-seeded Venus Williams blitzed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, 6-0, 6-1.

Other matches saw 10th-seeded Alize Cornet top Julia Schruff, 6-1, 6-2; 11th-seeded Marion Bartoli outlast Francesca Schiavone, 7-6 (7-5), 3-6, 6-3; No. 12-seeded Dominika Cibulkova beat Tsvetana Pironkova, 7-6 (7-5), 6-4; 13th-seeded Zheng Jie rally for a, 3-6, 7-5, 7-5 win over Samantha Stosur; No. 14th-seeded Anabel Medina Garrigues get by Alona Bondarenko, 6-2, 7-5; and 16th-seeded Kaia Kanepi stop Sania Mirza, 7-5, 6-2.

Camille Pin and Daniela Hantuchova also advanced to the tournament's third round.