The Latest: Williams Staves Off Watson At Wimbledon

Serena Williams of the United States celebrates winning a point against Heather Watson of Britain, during their singles match, at the All England Lawn Tennis Championships in Wimbledon, London, Friday July 3, 2015. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

Serena Williams of the United States celebrates winning a point against Heather Watson of Britain, during their singles match, at the All England Lawn Tennis Championships in Wimbledon, London, Friday July 3, 2015. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)

LONDON -- The latest from Wimbledon (all times local):

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Serena Williams erased three breaks in the final set to stave off an upset bid by British home favorite Heather Watson in the third round of Wimbledon.

Williams was broken twice to trail 3-0 in the decider before turning things around, winning 6-2, 4-6, 7-5 Friday to keep alive her bid for a calendar-year Grand Slam. Williams went up 4-3 in the final set only to be broken again in the ninth game, giving Watson a chance to serve out the match. Williams broke right back again, however, held at love and then converted her third match point.

The 59th-ranked Watson had the partisan Centre Court crowd roaring throughout but fell short of becoming the first British woman to beat a No. 1 since Sue Barker defeated Chris Evert in Boston in 1979.

Williams will next face big sister Venus in the fourth round.

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6:35 p.m.

Heather Watson is taking five-time champion Serena Williams to a third set at Wimbledon - raising British hopes of another major upset on Centre Court.

The British player broke the top-ranked Williams twice in the second set to level their third-round match 2-6, 6-4 - setting off raucous applause from the partisan crowd.

Watson then broke Williams in the opening game of the third set.

The winner will face Venus Williams in the fourth round.

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6:30 p.m.

Venus Williams is back in the fourth round of Wimbledon for the first time since 2011.

The five-time champion beat Aleksandra Krunic of Serbia 6-3, 6-2 Friday and could next face sister Serena, who was playing Heather Watson of Britain on Centre Court.

Venus Williams is playing her 18th Wimbledon, while the 82nd-ranked Krunic was making her first appearance at the All England Club.

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5:20 p.m.

Novak Djokovic is used to signing all kinds of items for fans, but this was a new one even for him.

After his third-round victory at Wimbledon on Friday, the top-ranked defending champion stopped as he usually does to sign autographs for supporters before exiting Centre Court. Along with the usual programs and oversized tennis balls that people normally hand over, one man gave the Serb something a bit more unusual - his prosthetic leg.

Djokovic signed the artificial limb and handed it back.

"I hope the signature is going to make him feel better," Djokovic said.

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5:00 p.m.

Defending champion Novak Djokovic kept up his winning streak against Australian players by easily beating Bernard Tomic 6-3, 6-3, 6-3 Friday in the third round at Wimbledon.

A day after Rafael Nadal was stunned by Dustin Brown on Centre Court, Djokovic put in a clinical performance that never gave Tomic any hopes of a similar upset. Djokovic has not lost to an Australian in a tour-level match since 2006.

Djokovic broke four times, never faced a break point and made just 12 unforced errors the whole match. He has not dropped a set so far in the tournament.

Neither has Maria Sharapova, who ousted 29th-seeded Irina-Camelia Begu 6-4, 6-3 in a match that wrapped up minutes earlier on Court 1.

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4:20 p.m.

CoCo Vandeweghe of the U.S. is into the second week at a Grand Slam tournament for the first time.

The 47th-ranked Vandeweghe, the niece of former NBA player and executive Kiki, beat 2011 U.S. Open champion Sam Stosur, who was seeded 22nd at Wimbledon, 6-2, 6-0 in the third round Friday.

It took only an hour.

Stosur, who also lost to Vandeweghe at the Australian Open in January, has never had much success at the All England Club, never making it to the fourth round. This was only the third time in 13 appearances she even got as far as the third round.

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4:05 p.m.

Belinda Bencic of Switzerland ended Bethanie Mattek-Sands' run at Wimbledon, knocking out the 158th-ranked American in straight sets in the third round.

Bencic won 7-5, 7-5 in a match that saw 10 breaks of serve and lasted 1 hour, 49 minutes on Court 18.

Mattek-Sands had to go through qualifying just to make the main draw and was the lowest-ranked woman left in the tournament. She was one of six American women to reach the third round, the highest total since 2005.

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3:20 p.m.

Nick Kyrgios came from a set down to beat Milos Raonic 5-7, 7-5, 7-6 (3), 6-3 on Friday in the third round at Wimbledon.

The Australian double-faulted three times in the final game of the first set but rode his big serve the rest of the way, finishing with 34 aces to beat the Canadian on Court No. 2.

As always, Kyrgios put on quite a show along the way. He received a code violation for throwing his racket so hard to the ground that it bounced into the crowd, and was told to turn his Wimbledon headband inside out because the green-and-purple stripes on it were too colorful.

Kyrgios is best known for beating Rafael Nadal here in the fourth round last year at the age of 19. He will next play Richard Gasquet of France.

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3:10 p.m.

French Open champion Stan Wawrinka is into the fourth round of Wimbledon after beating Fernando Verdasco in straight sets.

The fourth-seeded Wawrinka won 6-4, 6-3, 6-4 in less than two hours on Court 1.

Meanwhile, Richard Gasquet of France improved to 5-0 against Grigor Dimitrov by beating the 11th-seeded Bulgarian 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 on Centre Court to make it to the second week of Wimbledon for the first time since 2012.

The 21st-seeded Gasquet needed five match points in the final game before closing out the win.

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2:50 p.m.

Even an official Wimbledon headband apparently does not comply with the official Wimbledon rules.

Nick Kyrgios sported one of the headbands - with thick stripes in Wimbledon's green-and-purple colors across the middle - in this third-round match against Milos Raonic on Friday. However, he had to turn it inside out after it was apparently deemed too colorful for the tournament's all-white dress code.

Wimbledon sells both headbands and armbands in its official stores at the All England Club.

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2:20 p.m.

David Goffin is the first player to reach the fourth round at Wimbledon.

The 16th-seeded Belgian beat Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 on Friday, reaching the final 16 of a Grand Slam for only the second time. Goffin is the fourth Belgian man in the Open era to get this far at Wimbledon, after Dick Norman, Xavier Malisse and Olivier Rochus.

Friday's victory extended Goffin's career record against Baghdatis to 4-0.

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1:30 p.m.

Nick Kyrgios double-faulted three times in the same game to give away the first set against Milos Raonic in their third-round match at Wimbledon - and didn't fare much better with his replay challenges.

At 6-5 down on Court No. 2, Kyrgios double-faulted on the first point and then stared toward the line judge and chair umpire after his second serve was called long. When the chair umpire asked if he wanted to use one of his Hawk-Eye challenges, the Australian thought for a second before replying: "Actually, umm, yeah, maybe not."

That drew laughter from the crowd, which then gasped when Kyrgios double-faulted again at 0-30 and 15-40. On that last point, he again looked up at the chair umpire after the first serve before challenging the second. Hawk-Eye, however, showed it was well long.

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12:05 p.m.

Wimbledon began with a minute of silence on Friday as Britain paused to honor the victims of the attack in Tunisia, where an Islamic extremist opened fire on beachgoers at a resort.

British tourists made up 30 of the 38 victims of last Friday's attack.

Visitors across the All England Club stopped in silence at noon, with the crowd on Henman Hill rising to their feet and ball boys lining up alongside the courts. The start of play on the outside courts was pushed back to 12:15 p.m. instead of the normal time of 11:30 a.m.

Play on Centre Court was set to start at 1 p.m. as usual.

Queen Elizabeth II and British Prime Minister David Cameron also observed a minute of silence at noon Friday.

Jul 3, 2:34 PM EDTAP

 
 

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