Cibulkova cruises, Wozniacki beats Puig in Sydney

Slovakia’s world number six Dominika Cibulkova dropped just two games in blistering heat to win her opening match at the Sydney International yesterday.
The diminutive Cibulkova, who upset world number one Angelique Kerber to win the WTA finals in Singapore last October, swept past Germany’s world number 31 Laura Siegemund 6-2, 6-0.
Cibulkova, who lost to China’s Li Na in the 2014 Australian Open final, will next play Canadian wild card Eugenie Bouchard in the second round of the WTA lead-in tournament to next week’s Australian Open.
“When you start a season, you always start with some confidence, not doubt, but you always need to get into this match rhythm,” said Cibulkova.
“It’s not easy if I would expect myself to play like I did in the (WTA) final against Kerber, I think that would be too much expectation.
“This is the time of the year when you just have to warm up yourself in the matches.”
Cibulkova, who lost to Agnieszka Radwanska in the Sydney final four years ago, was knocked out in the quarter-finals of last week’s Brisbane International by France’s Alize Cornet in straight sets.
Kerber and Radwanska, the top two seeds, have a bye into the second round at Sydney.
Former world number one and seventh seed Caroline Wozniacki dumped Olympic champion and last year’s finalist Monica Puig out of the tournament 6-3, 2-6, 6-4. Puig, who lost to Russia’s Svetlana Kuznetsova in last year’s final, had 12 break point opportunities but could only convert three, while Wozniacki put away three of four break points.
British sixth seed Johanna Konta was too strong for Australian Arina Rodionova 6-3, 6-4 and fellow Australian Samantha Stosur again bombed out in the first round, going out 6-3, 6-1 to Russia’s Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova.
“It was tough conditions out there. I don’t really know what to say,” said Stosur, who has not won a match in almost five months.
“I don’t feel like I played bad. I don’t feel like I played obviously as well as I can. It was just kind of done, and that was it.”
Russian eighth seed Elena Vesnina withdrew with a lower back injury when trailing American Coco Vandeweghe 6-2, 4-0. Russian-born Australian Daria Gavrilova advanced with a 6-3, 7-6 (7/1) win over Croatia’s Donna Vekic in a night match.
In the men’s draw, Australian qualifier Matthew Barton eliminated British number two Kyle Edmund 7-6 (7/3) 7-6 (7/5) and will next face either Gilles Muller or Alexandr Dolgopolov.
German fifth seed Philipp Kohlschreiber ousted Italy’s Fabio Fognini 6-4, 6-4 and Italian Paolo Lorenzi needed two tiebreakers to overcome German Florian Mayer 7-6 (7/4), 4-6, 7-6 (7/5).
Petkovic advances in Hobart
Withdrawals are rather common in Tennis but rarely has a player been in a situation as German Andrea Petkovic at the Hobart International in Tasmania where her first-round opponent changed twice.
Petkovic beat American Nicole Gibbs 6-4, 6-0 yesterday after not playing initial
opponent Misaki Doi due to a draw resuffle, and after the next opponent Naomi Osaka withdrew Sunday with a wrist injury.
She only learnt that she would play Gibbs 90 minutes before the match, the tournament said, but the former top 10 player Petkovic took it in her stride.
“It was so difficult, I had three different opponents over the last  three days. I really didn’t know, so in the end I was just like ‘I’m just going to go out on court and see what happens,’” she quipped.
“My coach is not here with me this week, so he texted me and told me  to prepare for a leftie because I was supposed to play Doi. So I desperately tried to find a leftie to hit with and once I found someone, they changed it to Osaka.
“So then he was like ‘find someone who hits really hard,’ so I was desperately trying to find someone, then it wasn’t Osaka and I didn’t know who I was playing so it was weird, but it’s okay,” Petkovic said.
Petkovic’s next opponent is another lucky loser, Veronica Cepede Royg, barring any further short-notice changes.
Meanwhile Angelique Kerber remained first in the women’s Tennis rankings issued Monday by the WTA although she went out early last week in Brisbane.
Kerber leads the way in an unchanged top 10 with 8,875 points from Serena Williams (7,080) who also bowed out early in her first event of the year, in Auckland. Agnieszka Radwanska is third on 5,420.
Czech Karolina Pliskova rose to a career-best fifth place after victory in Brisbane. Losing finalist Alize Cornet jumped 10 places to 31st in the rankings.
In the men’s rankings Andy Murray maintained first place ahead of Novak Djokovic although he lost to him in a weekend final in Doha.
Murray has 12,560 points in the latest ATP list.