Nothing could prevent Venus Williams from winning her opening match on Wednesday, postponed from the previous day due to the falling darkness. The American’s solid serve and deep, consistent groundstrokes led a straight set victory over the talented teenage Dutch Michaella Krajicek. Nadia Petrova was upset by Mara Santangelo earlier on the day.

In a quality encounter between the two hard-hitting ladies Krajicek stayed aggressive all throughout the match, but this was not enough to handle the pace generated by Williams. Serve was the major weapon of the five-time grand slam winner, who despite committing 6 double faults succeeded in forcing her opponent to move all over the court. She won 6-4 6-3 in an hour and 20 minutes.

“I was glad it was a lot warmer,” Williams said after the match. „Yesterday I was prepared to play in the snow, so this was definitely an upgrade. I made some mistakes on the court today, though I was able to correct them instantly. On clay it’s all about patience, so I try to keep the ball in play and vary the shots. I need to add more slices to my game. Today I only had two.”

Williams, who plays the J&S Cup for the fourth time, said she enjoys coming to Warsaw and always has a lot of fun in the city. “Warsaw is a good place to start the European clay-court season,” she stated. Russian Elena Dementieva will be the Williams second round opponent.

Russian Nadia Petrova, who had struggled with no-ranked Katarzyna Piter in the previous round, showed a poor level of play on Wednesday, and crashed out of the tournament after losing 3-6 3-6 to Italian Mara Santangelo. Poland’s Agnieszka Radwańska was also sent packing in the second round, as she wasted 6-0 lead to Alona Bondarenko before losing eventually 6:0, 4:6, 3:6.