DOHA — World No. 1 Victoria Azarenka stormed into the Qatar Open quarterfinals Thursday with a ruthless 6-0, 6-0 triumph over highly-regarded American Christina McHale. Defending champion Azarenka, who is at risk of losing her top ranking to Serena Williams this week, produced a relentlessly forcing performance over McHale, a 20-year-old who has already posted seven victories over top 10 opponents. The top-seeded Belarussian needed little more than an hour to remove the unfortunate American from her path into the last eight. Azarenka next faces Sara Errani, the world No. 7 from Italy, in a half of the draw which also contains Agnieszka Radwanska, the fourth-seeded Pole who was her semifinal opponent last year, and Caroline Wozniacki, the former world No. 1 from Denmark. Radwanska advanced with a craftily constructed 6-1, 7-6 (8/6) win over Ana Ivanovic, the former French Open champion from Serbia. Radwanska's reward is a quarterfinal with Wozniacki, who survived a testing encounter by 7-6 (8/6), 6-3 against Mona Barthel on an even windier outside court. In the late matches, Samantha Stosur of Australia beat Svetlana Kuznetsova of Raussia 6-4, 7-5 and Maria Sharapova of Russia downed Czech Klara Zakopalova 6-3, 6-3. On Wednesday, Wozniacki downed Sorana Cirstea of Romania 7-6 (7), 6-0. Marion Bartoli lost to Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-4, 6-4, while No. 17 Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic was beaten 6-4, 6-2 by McHale. Nadal out of doubles In Sao Paulo, Rafael Nadal will not play his scheduled doubles match at the Brazil Open because of “knee overuse,” organizers said. But they said the Spanish star intends to play his opening singles match Thursday against Brazilian Joao Souza. Nadal had been scheduled to team up with Argentina's David Nalbandian in a second-round encounter against Argentine Horacio Zeballos and Oliver Marach of Austria. Nalbandian beat Chilean qualifier Jorge Aguilar 7-5, 5-7, 6-3 in a difficult first-round match. Argentina's Horacio Zeballos, who won his first ATP title by beating Rafael Nadal last week in Chile, retired because of nausea and fatigue while trailing Paul Capdeville of Chile 7-6 (5), 0-6, 0-3. Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo retired with a right ankle injury after losing the first set 7-6 (6) to Joao Souza. — Agencies
