Tatiana Golovin
© AFP/DDP/File

ZURICH (AFP) - There was another upset when sixth seed Patty Schnyder was beaten 6-2, 7-5 by Daniela Hantuchova, but eighth seeded Italian Francesca Schiavone barely had to break a sweat as she beat American Meilen Tu 6-2, 6-1.

Anastasia Myskina lost her fifth first-round match in six tournaments when she was defeated 6-3, 6-3 by Swiss qualifier Timea Bacsinszky.

Golovin, who recently reached the final of the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix in Stuttgart, made a strong start, pressuring Vaidisova's serve and earning one break point in the first game and two more at 1-1 before breaking for 4-2 when Vaidisova made a clumsy backhand error.

From then on, Golovin dominated her frustrated opponent and swept to a comfortable victory over a player she had been unable to beat in their two previous matches.

Nicole Vaidisova
© AFP/File Yuri Kadobnov

"I was expecting a really tough match, but from the start I played very well," said Golovin.

"It's tough playing her usually, because she has the game where she only likes to hit winners, so when she's on it's very tough to beat her.

"But she was hitting double-faults because she was feeling the pressure from my returns.

"I served very well and I put pressure on her and I could tell that she didn't feel that comfortable out there, and that definitely helped me get in the match right away.

"She made a lot of errors and didn't look comfortable with her serve at all, so I really just took advantage of that and hit winners off the return and went for my serves. I think overall I don't think she knew what to do at all against me.

"I'm very glad the way that mentally I handled the match, because tennis-wise there wasn't really much tennis going on. It was more how I could stay focused and not give her anything, and I think I did that really well."

Patty Schnyder
© AFP/File Yuri Kadobnov

Schnyder looked listless against Hantuchova, afterwards laying some of the blame on a busy schedule, but she almost managed to rescue the match at the end of the second set.

After Hantuchova broke for 2-1 and 5-2 in the first set, courtesy of forehand errors from Schnyder, she appeared to have the match in her hands when she broke again to lead 4-3.

But she double-faulted at 5-4 to drop her serve for the first time, and had to break Schnyder again at 5-5 and survive a break point before finally serving out the match at her second attempt.

"I didn't get the chance to really play," said Schnyder.

"Just timing-wise, feeling the court and the balls, and on top of that she served very good. Her strokes are so flat and deep, so it's not an easy shot to get timing off if you don't have it from the beginning.

"I could have served better, but it wasn't the most important thing. She played a solid match, and I came after playing many tournaments in a row now."

©AFP