Third seed Victoria Azarenka reached the French Open quarter-finals for the third time on Monday with a 6-3, 6-0 win over 2010 champion Francesca Schiavone. The Australian Open champion will face either Bethanie Mattek-Sands of the United States or Russian 12th seed Maria Kirilenko for a semi-final place. Schiavone, the world number 50, matched the 23-year-old Azarenka shot for shot and scream for scream in a first set which featured six breaks of serve.

Results from the sixth day of the ATP Madrid Masters and WTA Madrid Open on Thursday (x denotes seeding): Women 3rd rd Anabel Medina Garrigues (ESP) bt Yaroslava Shvedova (KAZ) retired Maria Sharapova (RUS x2) bt Sabine Lisicki (GER) 6-2, 7-5 Serena Williams (USA x1) bt Maria Kirilenko (RUS x13) 6-3, 6-1 afp

By Iain Rogers MADRID (Reuters) - World number one and defending champion Serena Williams continued her serene progress at the Madrid Open when she eased past Spanish wildcard Lourdes Dominguez Lino 6-2 7-5 in the second round on Tuesday. Chasing a fourth title of the year and the 50th of her career, Williams had too much power for the slightly-built Dominguez Lino, who nonetheless managed to unsettle her illustrious opponent with some clever drop shots and lobs.

Maria Kirilenko kept Russia's hopes alive in their FedCup semi-final with Slovakia on Sunday as she beat Dominika Cibulkova 7-5, 6-1. Kirilenko, who is ranked 13th in the world, made light work of an opponent she has now beaten in three of their four meetings as she triumphed in one hour 41 minutes. "After yesterday's failure I managed to find my tennis today and it was the key to success in the match," Kirilenko said. "I played clinically trying to follow the plan which we worked out together with my coaches and it paid off as I won today."