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MELBOURNE – In the women’s draw, top-10 seeds Garbine Muguruza, Iga Swiatek and Anett Kontaveit all made comfortable starts to their Melbourne title charges, while Simona Halep and Aryna Sabalenka also won despite struggling with their serves.

Emma Raducanu, the US Open champion, was also victorious on her tournament debut but there was defeat at the first hurdle for her fellow 19-year-old Leylah Fernandez – the woman Raducanu beat in the Flushing Meadows decider. Canada’s Fernandez, the 23rd seed, went down 6-4, 6-2 to Australian wildcard Maddison Inglis, to the delight of the home crowd.

Spanish world No.3 Muguruza, a finalist at Melbourne Park two years ago, eased past 77th-ranked Frenchwoman Clara Burel 6-3, 6-4.

Comfortable

There was also little trouble for Kontaveit, despite some early nerves, and Swiatek, but Romania’s Halep was far from comfortable. The former No.1 laboured into round two 6-4, 6-3 after an error-strewn clash with Poland’s Magdalena Frech which saw 11 service breaks.

Second seed Sabalenka, who was reduced to tears and serving underarm in a disastrous lead-up to Melbourne, had Mark Philippoussis to thank after she revealed the Australian former world No.8 helped iron out some of her serving problems. She was far from perfect on her serve but survived to beat Storm Sanders 5-7, 6-3, 6-2.

In the last action of the day, Raducanu ousted the American Sloane Stephens – a former US Open champion – 6-0, 2-6, 6-1 in a performance that will make the Briton’s rivals sit up and take notice.