Updated

Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and Germans Sabine Lisicki and Julia Goerges, three of the top seeds at the $220,000 Generali Ladies Linz tennis event, came up losers Wednesday.

Romanian qualifier Sorana Cirstea fought back to upend the fourth-seeded Pavlyuchenkova 4-6, 6-0, 6-4 in the second round, while the sixth-seeded Goerges dropped her second-round match to Russian Evgeniya Rodina, a 6-3, 6-4 surprise winner.

Meanwhile, Italian Alberta Brianti bounced the fifth-seeded Wimbledon semifinalist Lisicki 7-5, 4-6, 6-3 in an opening-round affair on the indoor decoturf at TipsArena Linz.

A pair of seeds avoided first-round upsets, as No. 8 Slovak Daniela Hantuchova failed on a match point in the second-set tiebreak before holding off Croatian qualifier Petra Martic 6-3, 6-7 (6-8), 6-1 and No. 9 Italian Flavia Pennetta topped Russian Elena Vesnina 7-6 (7-4), 6-2 on Day 3. Hantuchova captured this Austrian event back in 2007.

Additional opening-round wins came for Australian lucky-loser Anastasia Rodionova and Patricia Mayr-Achleitner, who will face top-seeded Czech Petra Kvitova here on Thursday. The Wimbledon champion Kvitova was the Linz runner- up two years ago.

This year's Linz titlist will pocket $37,000.