Kvitova survives scare to reach Wimbledon second round

London, June 26 (RIA Novosti) Reigning Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova was stretched by Uzbekistan's Akgul Amanmuradova before winning her women's singles first round match here Tuesday.

Rain stopped play for around 25 minutes with the Czech World No. 4 leading 5-3 in the second set before she closed out the match on serve to win 6-4, 6-4.

Elsewhere, former French Open champion Francesca Schiavone was forced to fight back from a set down to beat British youngster Laura Robson.

Robson dominated the first set as Schiavone struggled with a back problem but the 24th-seeded Italian struck back in the second before holding on in the decider for a 2-6, 6-4, 6-4 win.

Schiavone's next opponent will be either Slovakian World No.46 Polona Hercog or qualifier Krystina Pliskova of the Czech Republic.

Russian 12th seed Vera Zvonareva closed out her Wimbledon first-round match with German World No.39 Mona Barthel, and faces Spain's Silvia Soler-Espinosa in the second round.

Zvonareva wrapped up a 2-6, 7-6(3), 6-4 win with a straightforward performance in the third set after play ended on Monday following the Russian's tiebreak win in the second.

Czech 19th seed Lucie Safarova lost 3-6, 0-6 in just 50 minutes to Kiki Bertens of the Netherlands, who is ranked 86th in the world.

Bertens will now play Kazakhstan's wildcard entrant Yaroslava Shvedova, who reached the fourth round of the French Open earlier this month.

Russian 31st seed Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova thrashed Sofia Arvidsson of Sweden 6-1, 6-2, and will now will face either Austria's Patricia Mayr-Achleitner or Varvara Lepchenko.

In the men's singles, Russia's Alex Bogomolov Jr. was knocked out by 22nd seed Alexandr Dolgopolov of Ukraine in the first round.

World No. 46 Bogomolov, who previously represented the United States, failed to make use of any of his 10 break points as he suffered a 3-6, 4-6, 5-7 defeat.

The next opponent for the Ukrainian will be Benoit Paire of France, who beat Australian Matthew Ebden 6-1, 6-3, 6-7 (1-7), 6-3.

Tenth seed Mardy Fish of the US booked passage to the second round by beating Spanish player Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo 7-6(3), 7-5, 7-6(1), and will now play either Spain's Pablo Andujar or British player James Ward.

Kei Nishikori of Japan, the 19th seed, crushed Kazakh Mikhail Kukushkin 7-5, 6-3, 6-4.

In the second round, he will face any of the two qualifiers Russia's Andrei Kuznetsov or Florent Serra of France.

--IANS/RIA Novosti

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