Venus Out and Serena Cruises in Opening Round of Australian Open

Venus Williams fell to Ekaterina Makarova in the opening round of the 2014 Australian Open on Monday, 6-2, 4-6, 4-6. Venus had been undefeated head-to-head against Makarova coming into the opening round matchup with a 2-0 record until Monday. Venus dominated the first set 6-2, and had a point to go up 5-4 in the second set, but Makarova fought back and took the final two sets 6-4, 6-4.

“I was fighting, fighting and finally turned around the match,” Makarova said.

"She played really well, and I think my level was just a little bit too up and down," Venus said. "I think my error count was a little high. I haven't looked at the stats yet, so I don't know what the errors were or what the first serve percentage was—I have to look at that and evaluate the match afterwards. Losing any match is never any fun, especially in a major. I definitely wanted a different result."

Venus will team up with her sister Serena to take on the 12th-seeded team of Italy's Flavia Pennetta & Kristina Mladenovic in women's doubles. Makarova will face American Irina Falconi in the second round, a 6-3, 6-1 winner over Spain's Anabel Medina Garrigues.

Luck was on the side of Venus' sister in round one, afive-time Australian Open champion Serena Williams dominated in her 6-2,  6-1 win over Australian teenager Ashleigh Barty on Monday in less than an hour. Serena finished the match with 31 winners to just five from Barty and only committed 17 unforced errors while forcing her Barty into nine, an impressive plus-23 differential. 

"It was a little tricky out there," Serena said. "It's good to get through that match. She could be a potentially dangerous opponent. She's really good. So I'm just really happy to finish that one."

Serena is now 53-1 in Grand Slam first round matches, the only loss coming against Virginie Razzano at the 2012 French Open, and will next face Serbian Vesna Dolonc in the next round.

Upset in round one as well was the number six seed, former Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova, a 2-6, 6-1, 4-6 loser to Taiwan's Luksika Kumkhum. Awaiting Kumkhum in the second round is Mona Barthel.

"I really want to know what happened out there," Kvitova said after her loss to the 88th-ranked Kumkhum. "Unfortunately I didn't play well. I didn't play my game and what I was really trying to work on all off-season. It was a great offseason and I was really excited to be here, but I probably wanted too much, and then everything just fell down."

Also in the opening round, it was the number seven seed Sara Errani, who fell to Julia Goerges, 6-3, 6-2; while Zheng Jie defeated Errani's doubles partner, the 12th-seeded Roberta Vinci, 6-4, 6-3; Alison Riske defeated the 23-seed Elena Vesnina in straights, 6-2, 6-2; Li Na was victorious over Croatian qualifier Ana Konjuh, 6-2, 6-0; Angelique Kerber defeated Australian wild card Jarmila Gajdosova, 6-3, 0-6, 6-2; the 14th-seeded Ana Ivanovic defeated Kiki Bertens, 6-4, 6-4; and the 17th-seeded Samantha Stosur was a 6-3, 6-4 winner over Klara Zakopalova.