Tennis: Safin buries past Aussie memories

Marat Safin buried the nightmare of his performance at last year's Australian Open to move confidently into the third round in Melbourne.

The Russian smashed a racket after his fourth round loss to Dominik Hrbaty in 2001, calling the match "ridiculous" and a "disaster."

This time around, the ninth seed worked hard for a 6-2 7-6 (8-6) 6-1 win over Christophe Rochus of Belgium.

Safin must now rank as one of the favourites now that the top five seeds - Lleyton Hewitt, Gustavo Kuerten, Andre Agassi, Yevgeny Kafelnikov and Sebastien Grosjean - have withdrawn or been knocked out before the second round.

But the mantra for Safin and other players who have watched the draw open up is, at least publicly, one match at a time.

Safin, who turns 22 in two weeks, was circumspect about the dearth of seeds, pointing out that Sampras, Andy Roddick and Nicolas Escude were in his half of the draw. A few hours later, however, Roddick withdrew from his second round match with an ankle injury.

"The young players, you didn't even hear about them, but they are doing well and they are very dangerous," said Safin, whose greatest triumph was his straight-sets demolition of Sampras in the 2000 US Open final.

Safin looked brittle during the second set against Rochus, muttering to himself and staring at his racket strings in frustration. He saved four set points in the tie-break with strong volleys and a couple of stray groundstrokes from the Belgian, who is ranked 78 in the world.

In 2000, Safin was fined $2,000 at the Australian Open for not making an effort during a loss to South African qualifier Grant Stafford.

"I'm a different guy, a different player," Safin said. "I'm ready to win this year, I think."