Wimbledon: Venus Williams into fourth round; Hewitt, Djokovic too.

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Second-seeded Venus Williams took a hard tumble in her last game while she was chasing down a powerful forehand from Alisa Kleybanova but that was one of the few missteps Wimbledon’s second-seeded player and five-time former champion suffered Friday.

Williams beat the 26th-seeded Russian 6-4, 6-2 and besides the fall, Williams also had a jewelry malfunction. She rubbed one of her earrings out with her towel, then took out the other and gave them to the chair umpire Enric Molina for safekeeping. Molina was a busy guy during the match. He needed to be treated by a trainer for a nosebleed during the second set. But he kept the earrings safe, handing them to Venus after the 1 hour, 37-minute match.

Afterwards Williams told the BBC, ‘More than anything I’m trying to stay in my head and keep my view of myself positive.’

Fifteenth-seeded Lleyton Hewitt dominated 21st-seeded Frenchman Gael Monfils, winning in straight sets 6-3, 7-6 (9), 6-4. Third-seeded Novak Djokovic had an even easier time, winning 6-1, 6-4, 6-4 over 28th-seeded Spaniard Albert Montanes.

Afterwards Djokovic talked more about his disappointment with his Serbian soccer team being out of the World Cup. ‘I’m not following it anymore. Serbia is out. I’m very frustrated,’ he said. His dissection of Serbia’s match against Australia?

‘I think Australia deserved to win because they were the ones attacking. I just don’t understand why we were defending in the second half. But that’s football. We should have gotten the penalty in the last couple of minutes of the game. If we had a draw, we would go through. But next time. Next time I guess.’

Next time for Djokovic will be against Hewitt, Serbia against Australia again.

-- Diane Pucin in Wimbledon, England