Sevastova saunters through in Bastad, Zheng makes Nanchang exit
Second seed Anastasija Sevastova coasted to a straight-sets victory over Anna Blinkova in the first round of the Swedish Open, while qualifier Eri Hozumi dumped Zheng Saisai out of the JiangXi Open in her homeland on day one.
Sevastova claimed her first WTA singles title of the year in Mallorca last month and is eyeing another in Bastad, where she took only 54 minutes to defeat Russian teenager Blinkova 6-3 6-1.
Blinkova racked up nine double faults and could only muster a first-serve percentage of 39 in a one-sided encounter, with Sevastova breaking three times in each set to advance at a canter.
Sara Errani came through 7-6 (13-11) 6-2 in her rain-interrupted match against Tamara Korpatsch, before the weather forced an end to the day's action with Katerina Siniakova leading Rebecca Peterson 5-3 in the first set.
No.2 seed Anastasija Sevastova advances to @Swedish_Open Second round!
— WTA (@WTA) July 24, 2017
Breezes past Blinkova 6-3, 6-1! pic.twitter.com/DSvW4jAdeL
Zheng's hopes of claiming a tournament victory on home soil in Nanchang this week ended when the seventh seed went down 6-2 2-6 0-6 to the 191-ranked Hozumi.
Hozumi is116 places below her opponent in the rankings, but dominated the second and third sets after losing the first to move into round two.
The 2014 champion Peng Shuai was among the Chinese winners on the opening day of the hard-court event, defeating Kurumi Nara 7-5 4-6 6-3.
Wang Qiang, Liu Fangzhou, Hsieh Su-Wei, Han Xinyun and Xun Fang Ying also made it through along with Nao Hibino.