Aryna Sabalenka continued her winning streak in her first clay match of the year after coming back from a break down in each set to beat Peyton Stearns 7-5 6-3 in her Madrid opener.
The Belarusian tennis star, who withdrew from last week's Stuttgart tournament, is the first seed in the Spanish capital and had a first-round bye.
Sabalenka faced trouble early on as she dropped her serve in the third game of the match, but immediately got the break back in the following game. After getting the break back, the top seed saved a break point in the seventh game to avoid going down by a break once again. Then, with the four-time Grand Slam champion leading 6-5, she managed to break Stearns in the 12th game when the American was serving to stay in the first set.
Pretty much the same scenario was seen in the second set. Stearns claimed the first break of the set in the third game to go 2-1 up, but Sabalenka recovered with breaks in the fourth and eighth games to erase the deficit and get the job done in two sets.
In the Madrid third round, Sabalenka will face world No. 33 Jaqueline Cristian.
What did Sabalenka say after beating Stearns?
"I'm just glad that I got the win. Maybe not that beautiful, but I felt by the end of the match, I felt much better on court. It wasn't an easy one. I did my work before coming here, but altitude and these courts and her game, it wasn't easy," the world No. 1 said in her on-court interview.
Sabalenka also admitted that it wasn't the perfect performance from her side.
"Today, I came in like it's a fresh start for me, and it wasn't maybe that smooth and movement maybe wasn't that good, I'm happy I got a win, and I'll just do some extra stuff tomorrow," Sabalenka added.
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