Murray survives, Safina exits

Britain's sole survivor Andy Murray reached the last 16 at Wimbledon on Saturday after surviving his toughest test yet against German Tommy Haas.

The 21-year-old Scot, seeded 12, came through 6-4, 6-7, 6-3, 6-2 to move into the second week where he will face flamboyant Frenchman Richard Gasquet for a place in his first grand slam quarter-final.

Murray played sublime tennis to lead by a set and a break before Haas pounced on a temporarily lapse to level the match on a tiebreak.

Haas missed an easy volley on a break point at 1-1 in the third set when Murray was wobbling and he was made to pay in the next game when he dropped serve.

Murray seized control again and Haas hardly got a look in as the home favourite surged to victory with some dazzling tennis.

Ninth seed Dinara Safina missed out on setting up a rematch with fellow Russian Elena Dementieva when she was harried out of the third round 7-5, 6-7, 8-6 by Israel's Shahar Peer on Saturday.

The French Open finalist, who had come within a point of defeat in successive matches at Roland Garros earlier this month, raised hopes of staging another great escape on Saturday.

In a topsy-turvy contest featuring angry outbursts, medical timeouts and code violations, Safina saved match points -- at 5-4 down in the second set and 6-5 down in the decider.

Hobbling around with a painful thigh, Safina eventually limped out on Peer's fourth match point, falling after three hours and 25 minutes with a tame double fault.

Next up for Peer will be Dementieva, who squandered a match point against Safina in the Paris quarter-finals.

Meanwhile, Russian fifth seed Elena Dementieva battled her way into the fourth round on Saturday 7-6, 7-5 after a patchy and slow start against feisty Argentine Gisela Dulko.

Dementieva was annoyed with herself afterwards, determined from now on to be much more aggressive on her serve and come out fighting from the very first point.

The Russian, a quarter-finalist two years ago, started by dropping her first four games on a sunny number two court.

But then she suddenly found her rhythm, fought doggedly back and landed the tiebreak 7-2.

A ruthless Venus Williams [Images] and a hobbling Jelena Jankovic restored some order to the women's draw on Saturday to keep their grand slam hopes alive heading into the second week.

Champion Williams, seeking a fifth title at the All England [Images] Club, dispatched Spanish qualifier Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez 6-1 7-5 and heads for a fourth-round meeting with little-known Russian Alisa Kleybanova.

Following the shock exits of top seed Ana Ivanovic and former champion Maria Sharapova [Images] and, with Serena Williams [Images] also hitting her stride, the Williams sisters are now favourites to contest their third final at the All England Club on July 5.

Venus Williams had little more than a comfortable workout against Martinez Sanchez, racing into a 5-0 lead and though her 101st ranked opponent interrupted the run, the 28-year-old American sealed the set.

The Spaniard provided stiffer resistance in the second before Williams ended the match with her fastest delivery of the day, a 204 kph thunderbolt.

"I was happy with that one," Williams told reporters. "The first set was pretty clean. The second set she just changed her strategy, started playing better and got that break back. I played aggressive to get the break back.

"You know, I was pretty happy because she started putting some pressure on. I had some good answers."

Second seed Jankovic has yet to make the final of a grand slam and the Serb's hopes of progressing further in the tournament will depend much on how quickly she recovers from a knee injury sustained against Danish 17-year-old Caroline Wozniacki.

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