And yet, the normal reception of these works around the world has been sell-out houses. The result? Davenport won, 1-6, 7-5, 6-3, advancing to play Mary Pierce in the last eight.The number of the day was 11. Clijsters made 11 double-faults ­ five in the final set ­ and Pierce needed 11 match points to overcome the eight-seeded Patty Schnyder,of Switzerland, 6-1, 1-6, 6-4, after two hours. The American, competing in her first clay-court event of the year, had been stretched to three sets in each of the first three rounds.Moreover, with Clijsters leading, 6-1, 3-1, the outcome did not seem to be in doubt ­ except in the minds of the two players.

Pierce, the 2000 champion, almost reduced the spectators to tears ­ of laughter. As she struggled to put the match away she was warned for time-wasting between match points. Afterwards, Pierce said: "Anything more than two match points is too many."At least Pierce eventually gave the French followers a sense of relief after the latest nerve-wracked display by Am?e Mauresmo, who was defeated in the third round on Saturday by the 17-year-old Ana Ivanovic, of Serbia, 6-4, 3-6, 6-4.Sesil Karatantcheva, the confident 15-year-old Bulgarian who made the most of Venus Williams' errors on Friday, advanced to the quarter-finals, beating Emmanuelle Gagliardi, of Switzerland, 7-5, 6-3.Karatantcheva will play Elena Likhovtseva, of Russia, who defeated her compatriot Elena Dementieva 7-6, 5-7, 7-5.. Mathieu, backed by a partisan crowd fought back to take the third and fourth sets but Canas prevailed in the fifth set to go through, 6-3, 7-6, 2-6, 6-7, 8-6.

Whichever way you looked at it, Kim Clijsters, ranked 17th, was a strong favourite to defeat Lindsay Davenport, the world No 1, for a place in women's singles quarter-finals.The Belgian had won on their previous six meetings and had progressed to the fourth round without dropping a set. A highlight of the day was the completion of a third-round match between Guillermo Canas, the Argentinian ninth seed, and Paul-Henri Mathieu, of France, which had been suspended overnight with Canas leading, 6-3, 7-6, 2-2. But even so I was catching Kimi and then I saw him crash."Alonso ducked through a cloud of debris, and headed home for a triumph that does wonders for his title hopes.While Renault celebrated and McLaren set about picking themselves up after such bitter misfortune, Williams were privately gloating about a second place that makes it even less comprehensible why BMW's Dr Mario Theissen is so determined to take the team to the divorce court (the BMW Board meeting in Munich) tomorrow. "It was brave of Carlos to finish the match."Federer, who has yet to drop a set, next plays the unseeded Romanian Victor Hanescu, who advanced to his first quarter-final in nine Grand Slam tournaments with a surprising win against the 10th-seeded David Nalbandian, of Argentina, 6-3, 4-6, 5-7, 6-1, 6-2.Hanescu has played Federer once before, in a Davis Cup tie against Switzerland on indoor clay in Bucharest in 2004 Federer won, 7-6, 6-3, 6-1 "I think he has improved since then," Federer said. The next delay was for rain, and play was suspended with Nadal leading, 6-4, 3-6, 3-0.Roger Federer, the world No 1, took another step towards completing his set of the Grand Slam titles when his opponent, Carlos Moya, of Spain, was barely capable of swatting a fly because of a shoulder injury."I have very little to say except that I was able to save some energy," Federer said after putting Moya, the 1998 champion, out of his misery, 6-1, 6-4, 6-3.