Third seed Venus Williams defeated Italian Flavia Pennetta 7-6(1) 6-2 in the final of the $600,000 Tennis.com Zurich Open to claim her second singles title of the year and 38th career title.

The 2008 Wimbledon champion also won the Zurich title in 1999, while still a teenager.

The Tennis.com Zurich Open final was the first in four times that Venus Williams defeated Flavia Pennetta. The Italian, however, still leads their head-to-head series 3-2. Pennetta, who is expected to rise to a new career-high ranking of 14, was trying to become only the third player to beat Williams for a fourth straight match, after conquering her in Bangkok in 2007, then at Roland Garros and Moscow this year.

With the victory in her 60th career final Williams is expected to qualify for the season-ending Sony Ericsson Championships in Doha.

On her way to the Tennis.com Zurich Open title Venus Williams defeated Alona Bondarenko, Francesca Schiavone, second seed Ana Ivanovic, and finally Flavia Pennetta, who upset world No.1 Jelena Jankovic in the second round. (photo via Yahoo)

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Italian Flavia Pennetta defeated Spain's Anabel Medina Garrigues 6-3 7-6(6) to advance to the final of the Tennis.com Zurich Open.

The world No.17 Pennetta came from 3-1 behind in both sets. In the second set Medina Garrigues couldn’t serve out the set after breaking for a 6-5 lead, and forced a tiebreaker. Pennetta had saved one set point in the second set, before converting her first match point.

The 25-year-old Pennetta, who upset top-ranked Jelena Jankovic in the second round, reached her fourth final of the year. In 2008 the Italian has won two titles: Vina Del Mar and Acapulco.

In the Tennis.com Zurich Open final Pennetta will play either third seed Venus Williams or seed No.2 Ana Ivanovic. (via iht, photo: Getty Images)

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Top seed Jelena Jankovic fell 5-7 6-3 6-3 to world No.17 Flavia Pennetta in the second round of the Tennis.com Zurich Open and lost her first in 13 matches.

Pennetta has never before beaten Jankovic, and they had played five times before this Zurich meeting. Additionally, the 26-year-old Italian today defeated a number one player in the world for the first time.

Jankovic, who won three straight titles heading into the Tennis.com Zurich Open, beat Pennetta in straight sets last week at the Kremlin Cup after the Italian had knocked out Venus Williams.

The Serb has never made it past the second round at the Zurich Open in four tournament appearances. (photo: Getty Images)

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Sixth seed Venus Williams lost 6-4 2-6 6-4 to Italy’s Flavia Pennetta in the opening round of the Kremlin Cup in Moscow.

Pennetta and Williams exhanged breaks in the first set. The world No.18 Pennetta broke decisively on her third chance in the ninth game. Williams broke twice in the second set, but dropped serve in the first game of the third set and never recovered.

With the victory at the Kremlin Cup Pennetta has improved her record against Williams to 3-1.

The top four seeds, Jelena Jankovic, Dinara Safina, Elena Dementieva and Ana Ivanovic, have byes into the second round. (source: AP, photo: Getty Images)

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Sixth seed Dinara Safina advanced to the US Open semifinals with an easy 6-2 6-3 win over 16th seed Flavia Pennetta.

Safina earned a service break in the second game and later broke serve again to close out the first set. In the second, Pennetta broke at love to go up 2-1, but Safina broke right back, and then again for a 4-2 lead. The Russian cruised the rest of the way.

The 22-year-old Safina will play one of the Williams sisters in the semis.

On day eight of the US Open Safina said: "Sometimes, wherever I am, I feel like I have already been there for a year." Hopefully she has overcome that feeling, she will need to be fully rested to overcome her next opponent.

BTW: I really like this quote of Pennetta:

Can you just talk a little bit about your decision this year to really make a big push and to commit to your tennis?

"What decision? I just work a lot. It's not a big decision." We can all learn from this! (source: The New York Times, photo: safina-dinara.com)

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