Korea Open: Venus cruises into Round 2

Seoul:

Top seeded Venus Williams strolled into the second round of the Korea Open on Tuesday, defeating American qualifier Abigail Spears 6-2, 6-3.

Despite warm conditions at Seoul's Olympic Park tennis arena, Williams barely broke a sweat as she used her powerful serve to dominate the match. Spears, with her right arm heavily strapped, failed to win a single point from Williams's first serve in the opening set.

The second set continued in a similar vein. World No 9 Williams broke again in the opening game and held off a late rally from Spears to complete a comfortable win.

In other first round matches, defending champion No 5 Eleni Daniilidou of Greece won a hard-fought match against Denmark's Caroline Wozniacki 6-4, 6-4.

Martina Muller of Germany eased past local hope Han Sung-hee 6-1, 6-0, American Ahsha Rolle made short work of the Britain's Anne Keothavong 6-1, 6-1 and Frenchwoman Mathilde Johansson defeated Junri Namigata of Japan 7-5, 6-2.

Thailand's Tamarine Tanasugaen rallied from a set down to eliminate Casey Dellacqua of Australia 1-6, 6-3, 6-2 and Meng Yuan of China defeated New Zealand's Marina Erakovic 6-4, 6-4.

Williams, who won her sixth Grand Slam at Wimbledon this year, returned to the top 10 in the WTA world rankings for the first time since April 2006 after reaching the US Open semifinals earlier this month.