Pavlyuchenkova off to near-perfect start in Shenzhen WTA season opener
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova beat Ana Bogdan 6-0, 6-1 in just 53 minutes at the Shenzhen Open Sunday.
BEIJING (AFP) - Russia s Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova got off to sizzling start as she beat Ana Bogdan of Romania 6-0, 6-1 in just 53 minutes at the Shenzhen Open Sunday.
"I couldn t be more happy or more pleased with how I started this season -- well, almost, there s still two days to go," Pavlyuchenkova said after the match. "It s always tough to start the season after a long break when we haven t played matches for a long time.
The world number 42 will next face either Romania s Irina-Camelia Begu, or a qualifier who has yet to be determined.
Maria Sharapova will also be returning to competitive tennis at the Shenzhen Open with her debut game against Switzerland s Timea Bacsinszky on Monday.
The WTA World No.29 was forced to cut her 2018 campaign short in September to recover from a shoulder complaint.
"It s been a long recovery from the shoulder injury. Maybe for the first few matches I won t feel great and I will need to improve with every match I play," Sharapova said during a visit to the Shenzhen MSU-BIT University prior to the tournament.
