Tennis roundup: Wozniacki continues strong play

[October 19, 2016]  The Sports Xchange

Caroline Wozniacki continued her recent resurgence with an easy 6-2, 6-2 victory over American Madison Brengle in the first round of the Luxembourg Open on Tuesday.

Wozniacki, seeded second in this women's event, won last week's tournament in Hong Kong, and has won two of her last four tournaments since reaching the semifinals of the U.S. Open.

She lost the first game of the match against Brengle but then won 11 games in a row to take command.

Two other high seeds also advanced. Top-seeded Petra Kvitova was pushed in the first set, but dominated the second in a 7-5, 6-0 victory over Su-Wei Hsieh of Taiwan. Third-seeded Kiki Bertens of The Netherlands got past Annika Beck of Germany 6-4, 6-4 in her opening match of the tournament.

--Croatia's Ana Konjuh registered a first-round upset of sixth-seeded Barbora Strycova in the first round of the women's portion of the Kremlin Cup at Moscow.

The 18-year-old Konjuh posted a 6-4, 1-6, 6-2 victory over Strycova of the Czech Republic.

Seventh-seeded Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova of Russia was the only other top-10 seed in action. Pavlyuchenkova recorded a 7-6 (2), 5-7, 7-5 victory over Katerina Siniakova of the Czech Republic.

--Sixth-seeded Pablo Carreno Busta fought off a first-round upset bid to avoid an early ouster in the men's draw of the Kremlin Cup in Moscow.

Jurgen Melzer of Austria pushed the Spaniard hard but lost in the third-set tiebreaker as Carreno Busta prevailed 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (2).

Seventh-seeded Pablo Lorenzi advanced with a 6-4, 6-4 victory over Federico Gaio in a battle of Italians. Lorenzi will next face another Italian, Fabio Fognini, who swept aside Lithuania's Ricardas Berankis 6-1, 6-2 in 58 minutes.

--Argentine Diego Schwartzman upended seventh-seeded Frenchman Nicolas Mahut 7-6 (2), 7-5 to advance to the second round of the men's European Open in Antwerp, Belgium.

Schwartzman converted all four of his break points to bounce Mahut. Romanian qualifier Marius Copil also recorded an upset after needing one hour and 48 minutes to dispatch sixth-seeded Joao Sousa of Portugal 4-6, 6-3, 6-3.

Kyle Edmund outlasted Croatian Illya Marchenko 7-6 (7), 7-6 (5) to win his European Open debut. The 21-year-old Brit benefited from 13 double faults by his opponent to advance to face second-seeded Spaniard David Ferrer, who received a first-round bye.

--Sweden's Mikael Ymer got off to a strong start at his home-country tournament by shocking Spain's Fernando Verdasco in the first round of the men's Stockholm Open.

The 18-year-old Ymer swept to a convincing 6-2, 6-1 victory over Verdasco. Ymer is ranked 549th in the world and earned his first win on the ATP Tour. Verdasco, 32, is ranked 44th in the world.

Elias Ymer, the older brother of Mikael, didn't fare as well in his first-round match as Germany's Tobias Kamke rolled past him with a 6-4, 6-0 victory. Germany's Dustin Brown prevailed in a tough match by knocking off Luxembourg's Gilles Muller 4-6, 6-3, 6-3.

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