Russia’s Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova was made to fight for a place in the second round of the St Petersburg Ladies Trophy on Tuesday, beating veteran Klara Koukalova of the Czech Republic in three sets.
World No. 26 Pavlyuchenkova, who is seeded fifth in St Petersburg, needed 2 hours, 14 minutes to beat qualifier Koukalova 6-4, 4-6, 6-4. Her reward was a second-round meeting with Germany’s Carina Witthoeft, who defeated Austria’s Tamira Paszek 6-3, 6-3.
Monica Niculescu of Romania, the world No. 37, moved into the second round earlier in the day with a 6-0, 6-3 win over Russia’s Natalia Vikhlyantseva.
Niculescu, seeded ninth, broke the world No. 265 teenager in the eighth game of the second set to go up 5-3, then held serve for the win at the Sibur Arena.
Niculescu’s opponent in the second round of the singles is Hungary’s Timea Babos.
Barbora Strycova of the Czech Republic was playing in her first tournament since a strong run at the Australian Open saw her beat Garbine Muguruza, but was out of sorts, falling 6-3, 6-4 in the first round against Ukrainian qualifier Kateryna Kozlova.
Top seed Belinda Bencic of Switzerland had a bye in the first round as did the next three seeded players — Roberta Vinci of Italy, Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark and Ana Ivanovic of Serbia.
Four-time NBA all-star DeMarcus Cousins arrived in Taiwan with his family early yesterday to finish his renewed contract with the Taiwan Beer Leopards in the T1 League. Cousins initially played a four-game contract with the Leopards in January. On March 18, the Taoyuan-based team announced that Cousins had renewed his contract. “Hi what’s up Leopard fans, I’m back. I’m excited to be back and can’t wait to join the team,” Cousins said in a video posted on the Leopard’s Facebook page. “Most of all, can’t wait to see you guys, the fans, next weekend. So make sure you come out and support the Beer
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