Inactive since representing her country in the Fed Cup in mid-July, Mauresmo started slowly against her 53rd ranked opponent but grew stronger as the match wore on after fighting off a couple of break points early in the second set.

"Not so easy, especially the second set," Mauresmo said.

"Physically, I had some trouble to keep the rhythm and was making way too many errors to really finish it off the way I wanted to."

Third-seeded Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova [Images] had an even tougher time in her second round match, overcoming a terrible start to finally eliminate Anabel Medina Garrigues of Spain 2-6, 7-5, 6-4.

Like Mauresmo, Kuznetsova had a first round bye and she felt that might have been a factor in her shaky start.

"First matches are very dangerous because other players have already played some and know the ball, the surface," the U.S. Open champion said.

"Maybe I was a little bit nervous in the first set and couldn't find my game."

SERENA TESTED

In the evening, Serena Williams [Images] was another of the top ranked players given a tough test, and the fifth seeded American was forced to dig deep to overcome Stephanie Cohen Aloro of France [Images] 3-6, 6-4, 6-2.

Top seeded Russian Maria Sharapova [Images] withdrew from the tournament on Sunday and ninth seeded American Venus Williams [Images] pulled out last week with the flu.

They were joined by eighth seed Mary Pierce [Images] of France, who withdrew Monday due to a strained right quadriceps, making her the fifth top 20 player to pull out of the tournament in the past week.

In first round matches, 11th seed Jelena Jankovic [Images] of Serbia and Montenegro was the highest ranked player to lose when she was dumped 6-4, 5-7, 6-2 by China's Na Li.

Tenth seeded Nathalie Dechy [Images] of France moved on with a 6-2, 6-4 win over Fabiola Zuluaga of Colombia and number 12 seed Ana Ivanovic [Images] of Serbia and Montenegro defeated Italy's [Images] Tathiana Garbin 6-2, 7-6.

The 13th-seeded Daniela Hantuchova [Images] of Slovakia retired from her match against Russian Alina Jidkova with the match tied 4-6, 6-4, 4-4 due to heat exhaustion.

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