Wimbledon champion Iga Swiatek made a commanding start to her Canadian Open campaign on Wednesday, while Naomi Osaka staged a thrilling comeback and local favourite Eugenie Bouchard brought her professional career to a close in front of a supportive Montreal crowd.
Swiatek showed no signs of rust in her first outing since her dominant win at Wimbledon, dispatching China's Guo Hanyu 6-3, 6-1 with ease. The Polish star, seeded second, broke her opponent's serve six times to move smoothly into the third round.
In contrast, Osaka had to dig deep to overcome Liudmila Samsonova in a dramatic 4-6, 7-6 8/6, 6-3 battle. The Japanese star, now under the guidance of coach Tomasz Wiktorowski following her recent split from Patrick Mouratoglou, saved two match points in the second set. Down 5-2 in the tiebreak, Osaka clawed her way back, capitalising on Samsonova's unforced errors to stay alive. She then took control of the decider, breaking twice to build an unassailable 4-1 lead.
"She came out really strong," Osaka said. "I was overwhelmed at first, but I just focused on keeping the ball in play and finding my rhythm."
Meanwhile, Canadian tennis fans bid an emotional farewell to Eugenie Bouchard, who ended her WTA career with a second-round loss to Switzerland's Belinda Bencic. Despite going down 6-2, 3-6, 6-4, the 30-year-old thrilled the home crowd by taking an early lead in the deciding set, before Bencic surged back to win five of the final six games.