By ,
Published November 20, 2014
Petra Kvitova was an easy first-round winner Saturday at the $4.83 million China Open.
The fourth-seeded Czech routed Slovakian Daniela Hantuchova 6-2, 6-3 on the hardcourts at China's National Tennis Centre.
One other seeded player joined Kvitova in the second round, as No. 11 Serbian Ana Ivanovic handled American Christina McHale 6-3, 6-2.
Kazakhstan's Yaroslava Shvedova moved on after 12th-seeded Dominika Cibulkova retired in the second set. The Slovakian was trailing 6-4, 4-1 when she called it quits.
Additional wins came for Spaniard Carla Suarez Navarro, Swiss Romina Oprandi, American Varvara Lepchenko, Chinese Taipei's Su-Wei Hsieh, China's Shuai Zhang and Austria's Tamira Paszek.
The top seeds here are Australian Open champion and U.S. Open runner-up Victoria Azarenka of Belarus, French Open titlist and Aussie Open and Olympic runner-up Maria Sharapova of Russia and Wimbledon finalist Agnieszka Radwanska.
The Polish star Radwanska, a runner-up in Tokyo this weekend, defeated German Andrea Petkovic in last year's Beijing finale and was a finalist here in 2009.
All of the world's top-10 players are on hand in Beijing, with the exception of 2004 champ Serena Williams, who pulled out on Friday due to an illness.
The 2012 China Open champion will enjoy a windfall of $848,000.
https://www.foxnews.com/sports/kvitova-cruises-in-china-opener