Stosur, Dellacqua advance in Melbourne

(AAP) - Her emotions now in check, Samantha Stosur says her first-round breakthrough at the Australian Open on Tuesday will free her up for a sustained assault on the opening grand slam of 2010.

"It's always nice to get through that first one and know that you've got that under
your belt," Stosur said after recovering from a second-set lapse to notch a 6-1 3-6
6-2 victory over Chinese qualifier Han Xinyun.
"Then you can just kind of go out there and play. It does take a bit of pressure off.
"Even the guys that win these events, quite often they've had a tough one in the
first round, second round, third round."
It wasn't the most convincing performance ahead of a potential fourth-round clash
with top seed and defending champion Serena Williams - but a win's a win.
Especially after such a poor Open build-up - three losses from four matches this
summer for Australia's world No.13.
The 25-year-old made no secret she wasn't handling the heightened expectations on
her following a career season in 2009, when she reached the French Open semi-finals,
won her maiden WTA Tour title and knocked off the world's top five players.
But several heart-to-hearts with coach David Taylor last week helped Stosur bury her
demons at Rod Laver Arena.
"I was pleased I could go from playing well, dominating, not being in too much of a
battle out there, losing that set, then being able to regroup and get through the
third," Stosur said.
"I tried to not worry about what everyone else was saying or thinking, what was
going on. I knew how I was feeling in myself.
"At the end of the day, that's what counts and that's what matters."
After dropping her opening service game, Stosur reeled off eight successive games to
seemingly take a stranglehold on the match.
But Han, a teenager ranked 192nd in the world and making her grand slam debut,
struck back to send the match into a deciding set before Stosur steadied to close
out the match in one hour, 38 minutes.
Stosur will face German Kristina Barrois on Thursday for a place in the last 32 for
the fourth time in Melbourne.
"But by the time Thursday comes around, I'm going to be wanting to win as much as I
did today," the tournament's 13th seed.
"So it's always nice to get the first one done, but it's certainly not over yet."
Meanwhile, crowd favourite Casey Dellacqua revived memories of her thrilling ride to
the fourth round of the 2008 Australian Open with a rollercoaster victory over
Anastasiya Yakimova of Belarus on Tuesday.
Having missed almost all of 2009 following major shoulder surgery, Dellacqua was
understandably edgy when the opening-round clash went down to the wire.
And it showed, with the West Australian needing four match points before seeing off
the challenge of Yakimova 6-2 3-6 6-4.
"I was really nervous," said Dellacqua, 25, whose previous record at Melbourne Park
was six first-round exits along with the run to the last 16 in 2008.
"I obviously haven't been in a situation recently where I've been able to close out
matches.
"It was good to get the match at 5-4 because I was down in that game too."
Dellacqua revealed she had played with pain in her left shoulder for several years
before undergoing a full reconstruction early in 2009.
She only returned to the court late last year, in time to win the Australian Open
wildcard playoff.
"I took the break as a positive," she said.
"I thought 'well, I've been playing the game since I was 12 years old, and it would
be nice to have a little bit of a break'.
"I had a normal life and normal friends and just did normal things."
Dellacqua's next opponent is Croatian Karolina Sprem, who upset No.25 seed Anabel
Medina Garrigues from Spain 6-3 6-2.
Teenager Olivia Rogowska had her chances to win her maiden grand slam match, only to
fade out late in a 6-3 2-6 6-2 loss to Romania's Sorana Cristea.