Sabalenka overcomes nervy start in 1st-round win at Australian Open

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Aryna Sabalenka admitted she was a little bit nervous with Rod Laver and Roger Federer in the crowd for her first-round win at the Australian Open on Sunday.

The top-ranked Sabalenka, who won the Australian title in 2023 and ’24 and was runner-up last year to Madison Keys, lost the first three points and dropped her opening service game before rallying to beat Tiantsoa Rakotomanga Rajaonah 6-4, 6-1.

“I didn’t start my best. She showed up. Fired on. She was playing great,” Sabalenka said of the left-handed Rakotomanga Rajaonah, a 20-year-old French wild-card entry. “It was a tricky start. I’m super happy I found my rhythm at the end of the second set.”

Sabalenka prepared for the first major of the season with a title in Brisbane, which included a quarterfinal win over Keys. She has been in good form, and is into her 74th week with the women's No. 1 ranking.

In her on-court interview, she said she'd snuck a look and saw Laver, the Australian great who has the main court named in his honor, and 20-time major winner Federer sitting in adjoining seats.

“I’m a huge fan. I wanted to show great tennis so you guys enjoyed watching me play,” she said. “There was definitely a lot of pressure. I was walking thinking ‘don’t look there, don’t look there!’”

She shrugged that off and found her rhythm and was content with a straight-sets win.

“I mean, first of all, it’s the first match, right? You’re always kind of trying to figure out where you are,” she said.

Day 1

Alexander Zverev, runner-up here last year to Jannik Sinner, shrugged off a sluggish start to beat Gabriel Diallo 6-7 (7), 6-1, 6-4, 6-2 in the afternoon match on the first of 15 days in the tournament. He’s into the second round at Melbourne Park for the 10th straight year.

“Definitely, when I saw the draw, wasn’t too happy to be honest,” Zverev said of the tricky challenge presented by No. 41-ranked Diallo. “He’s very young, very talented. Unbelievably aggressive.

“First set wasn’t my best tennis, I would say. It got a lot better after that for me.”

Two of the women’s seeds went out in the opening afternoon, with Elsa Jacquemot ousting No. 20 Marta Kostyuk 6-7 (4), 7-6 (4), 7-6 (7) and Turkish qualifier Zeynep Sönmez upsetting No. 11 Ekaterina Alexandrova 7-5, 4-6, 6-4.

Sönmez halted her match briefly in the second set to help a ballkid who appeared to be struggling in the heat before the tournament medical team took over.

Seventh-seeded Jasmine Paolini beat Aliaksandra Sasnovich 6-1, 6-2, and No. 12 Elina Svitolina and Maria Sakkari also advanced in straight sets.

Former Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrousova withdrew because of a shoulder injury before her scheduled first-round match, giving a place in the main draw to Taylor Townsend, the lucky loser from qualifying, to take on Hailey Baptiste.

In a 2 1/2-hour all-American contest on Court 13, Baptiste prevailed 6-3, 6-7 (3), 6-3.

On the men's side, No. 29 Frances Tiafoe overpowered Jason Kubler 7-6 (4), 6-3, 6-2 and Michael Zheng fended off Sebastian Korda 6-4, 6-4, 3-6, 6-7 (0), 6-3 in an all-American first-round match on Kia Arena.

Zheng, a college star at Columbia who advanced through qualifying to make his tour-level debut, will next face No. 32 Corentin Moutet, who was booed after his underarm serve on match point in a 6-4, 7-6 (1), 6-3 win over Tristan Schoolkate.

No. 20 Flavio Cobolli became the first of the seeded men’s players to exit the tournament in a 7-6 (1), 6-4, 6-1 loss to British qualifier Arthur Fery.

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