Ninth-seeded Marion Bartoli of France plays Chinese Jie Zheng in her third round match of the Australian Open 2012. The match will be played on Saturday, January 21.
Bartoli was a straight-set winner over Virginnie Razzano 7-5, 6-0 in her first round before extinguishing the hopes of crowd-favourite Jelena Dokic 6-3, 6-2 in the second round.
Interestingly, even Zheng hasn’t needed to break out into any sweat, winning both her first two matches in straight sets. In the process, she also took out 23rd-ranked Roberta Vinci of Italy, 6-4, 6-2 to make it to the third round.
Earlier, Zheng dropped only three games in relegating wild-card Madison Keys to a 6-2, 6-1 first round defeat at the tournament.
Zheng and Bartoli have played twice before this third-round match and have won one apiece. In 2009 in the Monterrey Open, Bartoli won in straight sets 7-5, 6-3, but Zheng extracted her revenge in the 2010 edition of the Australian Open. The Chinese woman beat Bartoli at Melbourne, 5-7, 6-3, 6-0 at the same stage of the competition, the third round.
The Marion Bartoli v Zheng Jie Australian Open women’s singles third round match will be played on Saturday, January 21.
