MINSK, 19 January (BelTA) – Lidziya Marozava of Belarus and U.S. Kaitlyn Christian failed to advance into the second round of the Australian Open doubles event, BelTA has learned.
In the opener the Belarusian-U.S. tandem lost to Croatia-U.S. duo Petra Martic and Shelby Rogers, 1-6, 6-7 (4-7). Belarus' Aliaksandra Sasnovich and Russia's Anna Blinkova will open their Australian Open doubles run against Belgium-Russia duo Elise Mertens and Veronika Kudermetova. At the start of the singles event Aliaksandra Sasnovich lost to China's world number 111 Qinwen Zheng, 3-6, 6-1, 6-7 (5-10).
Belarus' world number 25 Victoria Azarenka kicked off her campaign in Melbourne with a 6-3, 6-1 win over Hungary's world number 98 Panna Udvardy and then picked up a swift victory over world number 34 Jil Belen Teichmann of Switzerland, 6-1, 6-2, to progress into the Australian Open round three. The Belarusian will next play Ukraine's world number 17 Elina Svitolina. World number two Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus saw off Australia's world number 128 Storm Sanders, 5-7, 6-3, 6-2, in the opening round. Aryna Sabalenka will next face China's world number 100 Wang Xinyu.
In the men's doubles opener Belarus' Andrei Vasilevski and Jonny O'Mara of the UK will take on Australia-U.S. tandem Mackenzie McDonald and John Millman.
In the men's opener Belarus' world number 106 Egor Gerasimov lost to Poland's world number 10 Hubert Hurkacz, 2-6, 6-7 (3-7), 7-6 (7-5), 3-6. Belarus' world number 47 Ilya Ivashka had to withdraw from the tournament due to an injury.
The first tournament of the Grand Slam season will be over on 30 January. The event's prize money totals $53.9 million. Last year the Australian Open men's event was won by Serbia's Novak Djokovic, the women's event by Naomi Osaka of Japan.
