Melbourne, Australia (Sports Network) - Second-seeded American Serena Williams was among Thursday's second-round winners, while her sixth-seeded big sister Venus Williams was a big upset victim at the 2009 Australian Open.
The Wimbledon champion Venus was stunned by scrappy 46th-ranked Spaniard Carla Suarez Navarro 2-6, 6-3, 7-5 on Day 4 at Melbourne Park. The American wasted a match point while leading 5-4 in the final set before exiting the draw.
A sluggish Venus was broken while serving for the match and wound up losing the last five games of the bout en route to defeat.
"She was super consistent and aggressive and just went for her shots," said Venus. "Probably one of her best matches she's ever played."
The 20-year-old Suarez Navarro was a quarterfinalist at last year's French Open.
"I wasn't in control of the points," the 28-year-old Venus added. "I'm definitely used to dictating the points a little bit more. It was kind of a pattern that wasn't the best for me."
The seven-time major titlist and former world No. 1 Venus has never won the Aussie Open. She was the 2003 runner-up here to Serena
The former top-ranked Serena, meanwhile, fired eight aces and overcame 29 unforced errors in order to beat Argentina's Gisela Dulko 6-3, 7-5.
The nine-time major champion Serena, who owns three Aussie Open titles, took advantage of 38 unforced errors by Dulko and saved six set points in the second set before advancing. She won the final five games of the match to set-up a third-round meeting with Chinese Peng Shuai.
"Today I was at like a D-minus at best," said a smiling Serena. "That's pretty far away. But it's good that I was able to win, too, when I wasn't playing my best. I definitely will try to do better."
Red-hot fourth-seeded Olympic gold medalist Elena Dementieva beat Czech Iveta Benesova 6-4, 6-1. The Russian Dementieva, who has never made it past the fourth round in Melbourne, stretched her 2009 season-opening winning streak to 12 matches.
"I feel like I had a very good start to the year," said Dementieva. "Right now it's the most important moment. That's why we're coming here to play the Australian Open. I just hope to play well here."
The two-time major runner-up Dementieva already owns titles in Auckland and Sydney this month.
Meanwhile, eighth-seeded Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova beat Tatjana Malek of Germany 6-2, 6-2. Kuznetsova is a former U.S. Open champ and has appeared in three major finals for her career.
Flavia Pennetta, the 12th seed from Italy, blitzed Aussie favorite Jessica Moore 6-4, 6-1, while Victoria Azarenka, the 13th seed from Belarus, was leading 4-1 in the first set against Tathiana Garbin when her Italian counterpart retired due to injury.
In another upset, France's Virginie Razzano knocked out 14th seed Patty Schnyder of Switzerland 6-3, 6-1.
No. 18 seed Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia and 20th-seeded Amelie Mauresmo of France also won their second-round matches. Mauresmo, the 2006 champion and 1999 Aussie Open runner-up, rallied for a 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 win over Great Britain's Elena Baltacha, while Cibulkova whipped Taipei's Yung-Jan Chan 6-0, 6-2.
Other seeded winners on Thursday were No. 21 Anabel Medina Garrigues of Spain, No. 22 Zheng Jie of China and No. 31 Alona Bondarenko of Ukraine.
Additional wins came for non-seeds Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez of Spain, Aussie Samantha Stosur, Ukrainian Kateryna Bondarenko and Chinese Peng Shuai. The heavy crowd favorite Stosur stopped promising German Sabine Lisicki 6-3, 6-4.
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