It is not everyday that a former Grand Slam champion is forced to qualify for the main draw of a Grand Slam event, yet that is the situation that Italian Francesca Schiavone found herself in at the 2016 Australian Open. The 2010 French Open champion, seeded sixth in qualifying, survived a tough encounter against An-Sophie Mestach 7-6, 4-6, 6-0 on a day when a number of seeded players were beaten.
The top two seeds Qiang Wang of China and Nicole Gibbs of the United States suffered no disappointment, as they both progressed with straight sets wins over Misa Eguchi 7-5, 6-2, and Olivia Tjandramulia 6-2, 6-2 respectively.
The same could not be said of Naomi Broady (3), the sister of ATP player Liam Broady. She was beaten by Alize Lim of France 6-3, 2-6, 6-3. Elena Vesnina (11), who has enjoyed a singles ranking as high as twenty-one in the world in 2013, was beaten 6-3, 4-6, 9-7 by China’s Lin Zhu. Sesil Karatantcheva (4) continued the poor luck for seeds going out after a 6-2, 6-0 defeat to Jessica Pegula of the United States.
There were wins for (8) Ying-Ying Duan, over Petra Martic 6-1, 6-2 and (14) Tamira Paszek over Kateryna Kozlova 6-2, 6-4, as some matches finally started going according to ranking.
Pauline Parmentier (10) then returned play to ranking upsets, as she fell 6-3, 6-2 to Risa Ozaki. She was joined in exiting the tournament by Patricia Maria Tig (12) who lost a real battle 7-6, 6-7, 6-3 to Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic.
Maria-Teresa Torro-Flor (13) and Cagla Buyukakcay (19) continued to add to the seed exodus, as they were beaten by Paula Kania and Maria Sakkari respectively. Rebecca Peterson (20) of Sweden followed, with a 7-6, 6-3 defeat to Lesley Kerkhove of the Netherlands, and Marina Erakovic (24) also suffered an early loss, 0-6, 6-4, 7-5 to Michelle Larcher De Brito of Portugal.
Latvian Anastasija Sevastova (5) managed to avoid the fate of so many others, as she defeated Destanee Aiava comfortably 6-3, 6-2. Shuai Zhang (18) also won by the same scoreline over Luxembourg’s Mandy Minella.
Kai-Chen Chang (22), Tereza Smitkova (17), Julia Glushko(16), and Alexandra Panova (21) all managed to win in straight sets.
Other selected results:
Yafan Wang defs. Katerina Stewart 6-3, 7-5.
Kai-Lin Zhang defs. Su Jeong Jang 6-2, 6-3.
Jana Fett defs. Sara Tomic 6-3, 6-2.
Ivana Jorovic defs. Olivia Rogowska 6-1, 6-1.
Arina Rodionova defs. Stephanie Vogt 6-4, 6-1.
Amandine Hesse defs. Kimiko Date-Krumm 6-2, 6-7, 6-4.
Hiroko Kawata defs. Silvia Soler-Espinosa 6-3, 6-7, 12-10.
Ysaline Bonaventure defs. Zoe Hives 6-2, 6-4.
Luksika Kumkhum defs. Alexa Glatch 6-3, 6-1.
