Tennis: Kazakhstan's Shvedova reaches qualifying final in Australia

Kazakhstan tennis player Yaroslava Shvedova has reached the qualifying final of the WTA series in Australia, Vesti.kz reports. Shvedova won over Chinese tennis player Su-Wei Hsieh in the second qualifying round with the score of 6:7, 6:3, 6:4, but failed to enter the main round of the Australian Open 2014 losing to American Christina Mchale with the score of 6:3, 6:4 on January 5, 2014. Another prominent Kazakhstan tennis professional Andrey Golubev won over Australian tennis player Dane Propoggia with the score of 7:6, 6:3, but failed to beat his next rival Henri Laaksonen from Switzerland losing 5:7 and 1:6 in two sets. The 2014 Australian Open is a tennis tournament that will take place in Melbourne Park in Melbourne, Australia, on January 13-26, 2014. It will be the 102nd edition of the Australian Open, and the first Grand Slam tournament of the year. The tournament will consist of events for professional players in singles, doubles and mixed doubles play. Junior and wheelchair players will compete in singles and doubles tournaments. Novak Djokovic is the three-time defending champion in the men's singles, whereas Victoria Azarenka enters the women's singles event attempting to win the title for the third straight year.