BRISBANE, Jan 4: Top seed Samantha Stosur crashed out of the second round of the Brisbane International here on Tuesday, losing 6-2, 6-4 to Jarmila Groth in a battle of Australia’s top two women.

Spanish third seed Fernando Verdasco was also upset in the men’s tournament, losing his first-round match 6-1, 6-7, 6-3 to Germany’s Benjamin Becker.

Top seed Robin Soderling of Sweden had no such problems, however, reaching the second round comfortably with a 6-2, 6-4 humbling of American qualifier Ryan Harrison.

World number six Stosur is considered her country’s best hope of ending a 32-year wait for a home Grand Slam champion at the Jan. 17-30 Australian Open.

Big-hitting Groth never let last year’s French Open finalist settle, however, and raced away with the first set on the back of seven aces.

Stosur fought back in the second to take a 4-2 lead but Slovakia-born Groth won the next four games in a row to claim local bragging rights and a place in the third round.

Verdasco, a semi-finalist at the Australian Open in 2009, recovered from a listless start to grind out the second set but had few answers in the third as Becker played a faultless service game to seal the match in just over two hours.

Results (prefix number denotes seeding):

Men’s:

First round: 1-Robin Soderling (Sweden) bt Ryan Harrison (US) 6-2, 6-4; 5-Marcos Baghdatis (Cyprus) bt Florent Serra (France) 3-6, 7-5, 6-4; Matthew Ebden (Australia) bt John Millman (Australia) 4-6, 6-2, 6-4; Richard

Berankis (Lithuania) bt Arnaud Clement (France) 6-4, 6-3; 4-Mardy Fish (US) bt Adrian Mannarino (France) 6-1, 6-4; Kevin Anderson (South Africa) bt Peter Luczak (Australia) 6-4, 6-4; Benjamin Becker (Germany) bt 3-Fernando Verdasco (Spain) 6-1, 6-7(2), 6-3; Radek Stepanek (Czech Republic) bt Tobias Kamke (Germany) 5-7, 6-1, 6-4.

Women’s:

Second round: Jarmila Groth (Australia) bt 1-Samantha Stosur (Australia) 6-2, 6-4; Lucie Safarova (Czech Republic) bt 2-Shahar Peer (Israel) 3-6, 6-1, 7-5; 5-Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (Russia) bt Bojana Jovanovski (Serbia) 6-2, 7-5.

First round: Roberta Vinci (Italy) bt Christina McHale (US) 6-2, 7-6(2).

WICKMAYER WINS

AUCKLAND: Belgium’s Yanina Wickmayer began the defence of her Auckland Classic title with a enthralling, hard-fought 6-3, 6-7, 6-1 first-round victory over former world number one Dinara Safina on Tuesday.

While the presence of Grand Slam title winners Maria Sharapova and Svetlana Kuznetsova has helped to effectively sell out the entire tournament, Wickmayer and Safina gave the capacity crowd the best value for money so far with a tough baseline battle filled with aggressive shotmaking.

Results:

First round: 4-Julia Goerges (Germany) bt Anabel Medina Garrigues (Spain) 6-4, 6-0; 8-Sofia Arvidsson (Sweden) bt Tamira Paszek (Austria) 6-3, 6-1; 2-Yanina Wickmayer (Belgium) bt Dinara Safina (Russia) 6-3, 6-7(2), 6-1; Simona Halep (Romania) bt Ayumi Morita (Japan) 6-0, 7-6(3); 7-Elena Vesnina (Russia) bt Marina Erakovic (New Zealand) 6-2, 6-2; Heather Watson (Britain) bt Noppawan Lertcheewakarn (Thailand) 6-1, 6-1; Alize Cornet (France) bt Sandra Zahlavova (Czech Republic) 3-6, 7-5, 6-0; Sabine Lisicki (Germany) bt Florencia Molinero (Argentina) 6-1, 6-3; 9-Carla Suarez Navarro (Spain) bt Romina Oprandi (Italy) 6-3, 7-6(7); Greta Arn (Hungary) bt Zuzana Ondraskova (Czech Republic) 6-1, 6-0.

TSONGA RETURNS

DOHA: Jo-Wilfried Tsonga dares believe he can make another significant challenge for the first Grand Slam title of the year after an impressively one-sided winning start to the new season at the Qatar Open on Monday.

The 2008 Australian Open finalist from France also hopes the worst of his recurring knee injury problems may be behind him after needing less than an hour to wrap up a 6-2, 6-0 win over Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo, the world number 77 from Spain, in the first round.

Results:

First round: Illya Marchenko (Ukraine) bt Mischa Zverev (Germany) 7-6(4), 6-4; Sergey Bubka Jr. (Ukraine) bt Daniel Gimeno-Traver (Spain) 6-0, 6-3; 4-Nikolay Davydenko (Russia) bt Fabio Fognini (Italy) 6-1, 6-4; 3-Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (France) bt Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo (Spain) 6-2, 6-0; 7-Guillermo Garcia-Lopez (Spain) bt Mikhail Kukushkin (Kazakhstan) 6-1, 7-6(1).

NISHIKORI STUNS CILIC

CHENNAI: Rising Japanese star Kei Nishikori ended Marin Cilic’s bid for a hat-trick of titles at the ATP Chennai Open with a first-round upset here on Monday. The 21-year-old, ranked 98th in the world, fought back after losing the opening set to knock out defending champion and world number 14 Cilic 4-6, 7-6 (7-0), 6-2 in two hours and 33 minutes.

Results:

First round: Kei Nishikori (Japan) bt 2-Marin Cilic (Croatia) 4-6, 7-6 (7-0), 6-2; Bjorn Phau (Germany) bt Simone Bolelli (Italy) 6-2, 6-2; Robert Kendrick (US) bt Denis Gremelmayr (Germany) 7-6 (7-1), 6-4; Stephane Robert (France) bt Andreas Haider-Maurer (Austria) 6-4, 6-4; Ivan Dodig (Croatia) bt Marcos Daniel (Brazil) 6-2, 6-2; 6-Janko Tipsarevic (Serbia) bt Eduardo Schwank (Argentina) 6-3, 6-4.—Agencies?