The 24-year-old Russian’s best performance in six previous trips to Melbourne was the fourth round — she’d gone out in the first round at the Australian Open three times, including last year. She also reached the quarterfinals at the 2003 French Open.
Seventh-seeded Zvonareva rallied from an opening service break to dominate Bartoli in the remainder of the match.
“I’m very excited about it,” said Zvonareva, who cut her unforced errors from 15 in the first set to two in the second. “I think it was a great day for me.”
She’s had four 6-0 sets out of the 10 in her five straight-sets wins.
“I’m not really thinking about the scores or sets or any statistics,” she said. “I’m just trying to concentrate on every match and trying my best. And I think I’ve been doing pretty good so far.”
Bartoli, seeded 16th, had ousted top-ranked Jelena Jankovic in the fourth round.
“I think she played just unbelievably well,” Bartoli said of the last 11 games. “She barely missed one ball after that. I was hitting as hard as I could. She was always coming back with some better shots.”
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Zvonareva starts strong, rolls into semifinals
