PALERMO, Italy - Day 1 was a busy one for Italians at the Internazionali Femminili di Tennis di Palermo, as four of them were in first round action, with two of them moving on.
Roberta Vinci, who won her second career Sony Ericsson WTA Tour singles title at Barcelona earlier this year and was a semifinalist at this event in 2006, outlasted Lourdes Domínguez Lino, 46 64 76(3). She will face fellow Italian Flavia Pennetta in the round of 16 if the No.1 seed gets through her first round match.
Seventh-seeded Aravane Rezai, who won her first Tour singles title earlier this year at Strasbourg and was a quarterfinalist here in 2006, defeated Galina Voskoboeva for the first time in three career meetings. Next up for the Frenchwoman is Varvara Lepchenko, who topped 19-year-old Italian Corinna Dentoni, 63 62.
On the bottom half of the draw, another Italian, Alberta Brianti, provided the tournament's first upset, as she was up 63 40 on fourth-seeded 18-year-old Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova when the Russian retired with a right shoulder injury. Brianti also won their only previous encounter, in the final round of Palermo qualifying last year.
Also Monday, Arantxa Rus, Olga Savchuk, Arantxa Parra Santonja and Anastasia Pivovarova all secured main draw berths with victories in the final round of qualifying.
Seeded players in action Tuesday consist of Pennetta against Parra Santonja, No.3 seed Alizé Cornet versus newly crowned Bastad champion María José Martínez Sánchez, No.5 seed Sara Errani against Mariya Koryttseva, No.6 seed Ekaterina Makarova versus Jill Craybas and No.8 seed Gisela Dulko against Anna-Lena Groenefeld.
