Rod’s A-hot; Sharapova returns from the dead

The second seed raced through his opening match in 72 minutes to set up a potentially tricky second round meeting with Spain’s Rafael Nadal.

Sharapova arrived in New York billed as the new queen of tennis after her dazzling win over Serena Williams in the Wimbledon final, but she was forced to rough it against gutsy American Laura Granville, scraping a 6-3, 5-7, 7-5 victory.

The Florida-based Russian mixed sublime winners with a rash of unforced errors but showed real character when she served to stay in the match at 4-5 in the decider. When a fierce first serve finally ended the contest after two hours, nine minutes of pulsating action, she breathed her huge sigh of relief and pumped her fists.

Earlier top seed and defending women’s champion Justine Henin-Hardenne was given a scare by 15-year-old Czech qualifier Nicole Vaidisova when she fell 4-1 behind in the second set after taking the first 6-1 in 17 minutes. Normal service was resumed as she won five consecutive games but the Belgian admitted the teenager, who won her first WTA tournament in Vancouver earlier this month, had proved a big surprise.

Fifth seed Lindsay Davenport, who is one of the favourites to challenge Henin-Hardenne for the title, cruised into the second round with a 6-4, 6-0 defeat of Slovakia’s Lubomira Kurhajcova — her 18th consecutive victory.

Another serious contender for the title, French Open champion Anastasia Myskina, was equally impressive, crushing Ludmila Cervanova 6-1, 6-0 in 42 minutes to lead a total of 11 Russian women into the second round.

Eleventh seed Venus Williams also moved through with an unconvincing 6-3, 7-6 win against Hungary’s Petra Mandula.

In men’s first round action Russia’s Marat Safin, the 2000 champion, suffered his earliest US Open exit in six attempts as the 13th seed slumped to a 7-6, 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 defeat to Swede Thomas Enqvist.

Last year’s beaten men’s finalist Juan Carlos Ferrero survived, just, although he will have to improve dramatically if he is going to make a similar impact this year. He beat Czech Tomas Zib 4-6, 7-5, 7-6, 6-7, 6-3.

Fifth seed Tim Henman beat giant Croatian Ivo Karlovic 7-6, 6-7, 4-6, 6-4, 6-4.

Double Olympic gold medallist Nicolas Massu of Chile maintained his hot streak, blasting away Jose Acasuso of Argentina for the loss of just six games.

Among the other casualties were men’s 24th seed Ivan Ljubicic who fell to Lee Hyung-taik of South Korea and Germany’s Rainer Schuettler who squandered a two-set lead against Italian Andreas Seppi.

(Reuters)