Serena Wills Herself to Find Way to Win

Serena Williams kept trying to impose her considerable will on the outcome of a point, contorting even after the ball spun off her racket or that of her opponent, Maria Kirilenko.

On this day, she needed all powers of persuasion, and then some, in her arsenal, rallying from a service break down in the third set against the hard-hitting Russian. Kirilenko, making her French Open debut, matched Williams shot for shot for the better part of two hours in the second round before succumbing Thursday.

Williams barely avoided the second-round fate of defending champion Justine Henin-Hardenne of Belgium, who lost Wednesday on the same court. The second-seeded Williams defeated Kirilenko, 4-6, 6-2, 6-4, on Court Suzanne Lenglen, and could only shake her head after escaping against the creative 17-year-old.

“I pretty much stood out there and just told myself to keep fighting,” Williams said. “I felt like I was down the whole time. I didn’t feel like at any point that I was up in the match.”

But Williams is experienced enough to power through the smallest of openings. The opportunity to set things right came in the eighth game with Kirilenko serving at 4-3. The excited crowd decided to go retro, doing the wave, and Kirilenko and Williams played through the noise on the first point. Williams took it on a net-cord winner, and then Kirilenko served back-to-back double faults.

At love-40, she saved one break point, but Williams broke at 15 with a forehand winner and would not lose another game.

“I think I mostly lost my concentration because I serve two double faults,” said Kirilenko, who had three of her six double faults in the third set.

Williams might have been down on herself, saying she “made like a thousand mistakes,” but she was able to raise her level in a major way. To a lesser extent, the same thing happened to her older sister, No. 4 Venus Williams. She lost the first three games against Jelena Kostanic of Croatia but rebounded to win, 6-3, 6-3.

Neither of the Williamses played much before the French Open, because of injuries and self-imposed layoffs. Serena appeared in one European tuneup event, reaching the semifinals in Rome. But if her game was rusty Thursday, her competitive spirit was not. In the sixth game of the third set, she ran wide for a shot and went into the advertising boards, getting acquainted with a courtside flower bed.

Kirilenko, the U.S. Open junior champion in 2002, was just as tenacious. She suffered a skinned knee in a tumble and later drew applause from Williams in the third set, after tracking down a drop shot and hitting a sliding backhand winner. Williams clapped her racket at the effort from the poised youngster.

“I think [Williams] didn’t know what to expect, because Maria, she’s a new player,” said Elena Bryukhovets, who is Kirilenko’s coach and helped serve as interpreter.

Said Kirilenko: “She didn’t know me.”

Thursday resembled the previous three days of the tournament in that history was made. The event continued to be rough on defending champions, with No. 4 Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain joining Henin-Hardenne on the sideline. In the second round, Igor Andreev of Russia defeated Ferrero, 6-4, 6-2, 6-3, hitting an ace on match point.

It is the first time in Grand Slam history that the defending champions exited before the third round, officials said. Though, in some cases, the titleholder didn’t play the next year.

Ferrero came to the French Open with a rib injury and needed a painkilling injection to get through his first-round match. He suffered from leg cramps against Andreev.

“Quite truthfully, I wasn’t feeling too well, too strong in my mind,” Ferrero said. “I don’t feel too well now. I think that’s normal. After my rib started to get better, it’s something else.”

Others had physical problems Thursday. Xavier Malisse of Belgium advanced to the third round when German qualifier Daniel Elsner retired in the second set because of a viral infection. Anna-Lena Groenefeld of Germany was forced to quit against Elena Bovina of Russia in the first set because of a twisted left knee. And Victor Hanescu of Romania stopped in the fifth set against Martin Verkerk of the Netherlands because of cramps.

Marat Safin of Russia and Felix Mantilla of Spain needed treatment during their grueling encounter. Officials stopped the match at 7-7 in the fifth set because of darkness. Mantilla served for the match three times in the fifth set.

Australian Open champion Roger Federer of Switzerland and three-time French Open champion Gustavo Kuerten will play in a marquee third-round match Saturday. The top-seeded Federer, who lost here in the first round the last two years, survived a reasonable test Thursday, defeating Nicolas Kiefer of Germany, 6-3, 6-4, 7-6 (6), fighting off two set points in the third-set tiebreaker.

“It’s a great match for the tournament and for us too,” Federer said of playing Kuerten. “We haven’t played much because of injury or playing sometimes on different surfaces. ... So if I can get through him I think that is for me a huge step.”

*

At a Glance

Day 4 highlights:

* Men’s seeded winners: No. 1 Roger Federer, No. 8 David Nalbandian, No. 12 Lleyton Hewitt, No. 19 Martin Verkerk, No. 23 Feliciano Lopez, No. 26 Albert Costa, No. 28 Gustavo Kuerten.

* Women’s seeded winners: No. 2 Serena Williams, No. 4 Venus Williams, No. 6 Anastasia Myskina, No. 7 Jennifer Capriati, No. 11 Svetlana Kuznetsova, No. 17 Francesca Schiavone, No. 23 Fabiola Zuluaga, No. 25 Elena Bovina, No. 30 Mary Pierce.

*

TODAY’S FEATURED MATCHES

* Marissa Irvin vs. Lindsay Davenport (5)

* Vera Zvonareva (10), Russia, vs. Maria Sharapova (18),

Russia

* Carlos Moya (5), Spain, vs. Raemon Sluiter, Netherlands