ISTANBUL: Victoria Azarenka overcame a spirited Sara Errani in straight sets in the opening match of the TEB BNP Paribas WTA Championships — Istanbul on Tuesday.

After a slow start, Azarenka found her rhythm to close out a hard-fought 7-6 (4) 6-2 win.

Errani, who is appearing in Istanbul for the second straight year, looked in her element in front of a packed crowd at the Sinan Erdem Dome, settling immediately as she raced to a 5-2 lead.

However, she was unable to capitalize on this early advantage and was made to pay as Azarenka fought back to take the set in a tie-break.

Errani’s hopes of turning the match around were dealt a double blow at the start of the second when she suffered a calf injury while dropping serve in the third game. While the Italian showed great courage to break back immediately, it was to be her last stand as Azarenka rattled off the final four games to take an early lead in the White Group.

“I think it’s normal that I took a while to find my game as I haven’t played in a while,” Azarenka said. “It’s not easy to play after a break against a Top 10 player, especially one as tough as Sara.

“I was missing a little bit too much at the beginning but I turned it around. It was a little bit difficult to focus in the second set because I didn’t know what was going on [with Errani’s injury]. Even after the time-out, she was returning unbelievably and fought until the last point.”


Istomin earns meeting with Federer

In Basel, Switzerland, Uzbek Denis Istomin on Tuesday booked a second round meeting with former world No. 1 Roger Federer at the Swiss Indoors in Basel as he beat Argentinian Horacio Zeballos 7-5, 7-6 (7/3).

Federer, whose poor form this season which has yielded one title and seen him slump to sixth in the world, is battling to reach the eight-man year-end finals in London in early November, with every win this week and next in Paris crucial to him appearing in a tournament he has won six times.

He began with a victory in front of his home crowd on Monday as he beat Frenchman Adrian Mannarino.

Federer has never lost to 48th ranked Istomin in five matches, defeating him most recently at Indian Wells in March despite suffering from a painful back.

Japanese sixth seed Kei Nishikori, losing finalist two years ago to Federer, reached the second round 6-2, 6-4 over another 32-year-old Swiss Marco Chiudinelli, a wild card entry and childhood friend of Federer.

Nishikori next plays Croatian Ivan Dodig, who advanced in just nine minutes as Argentine Carlos Berlocq retired trailing 2-0.

Marcos Baghdatis also reached the second round, winning his first match since late September with a defeat of German qualifier Benjamin Becker 7-6 (10/8), 6-1.

The Cypriot will face the winner from top-seed and title-holder Juan Martin del Potro and Swiss wild card Henri Laaksonen.