Tournament favourites Novak Djokovic and Serena Williams raced into the third round of the Australian tennis Open on the third day, while controversy over play continuing in scorching temperatures rumbled on.
Cloud cover and a gusty wind helped keep temperatures just below the peak of 42.2 degrees Celsius they reached on Tuesday, when Canadian Frank Dancevic passed out and accused organisers of forcing players to play in "inhumane" conditions.
Ivan Dodig became the 10th player to retire in the first three days of the tournament, though, when the Croatian was unable to complete his match against Bosnian qualifier Damir Dzumhur on one of the exposed outer courts at Melbourne Park.
Djokovic thrashed Argentine Leonardo Mayer 6-0 6-4 6-4 in just 107 minutes on Rod Laver Arena, while Williams also hot-footed it into the third round with a one-sided 6-1 6-2 demolition of Vesna Dolonc of Serbia.
Chinese fourth seed Li Na also went through, beating 16-year-old Swiss qualifier Belinda Bencic 6-0 7-6, while former grand slam champions Ana Ivanovic of Serbia and Australian Samantha Stosur had straightforward two-set victories to set up a third round meeting on Friday, when temperatures could hit 44 degrees Celsius.
Third seed David Ferrer edged Frenchman Adrian Mannarino 7-6 5-7 6-0 6-3, while world number eight Stan Wawrinka also needed four sets to get past Alejandro Falla of Colombia 6-3 6-3 6-7 6-4.
Seventh seeded Czech Tomas Berdych and France's Richard Gasquet also progressed, as did 15th seed Fabio Fognini of Italy, 17th seeded Spaniard Tommy Robredo, 19th seeded South African Kevin Anderson and American Sam Querrey.
The 14th seed Mikhail Youzhny's loss to Germany's Florian Mayer was the biggest upset on the men's side, and German 14th seed Sabine Lisicki the biggest casualty on the women's side, thanks to Romanian Monica Niculescu.
China's Zheng Jie, Canada's Eugenie Bouchard, Alison Riske of the USA are also through while Australian wildcard Casey Dellacqua knocked out the 18th seed Kirsten Flipkens of Belgium.
Others to progress included German ninth seed Angelique Kerber, Italian veteran Flavia Pennetta, Slovakian Daniela Hantuchova, the Czech Lucie Safarova and Russia's Ekaterina Makarova.
