BRISBANE: Aryna Sabalenka said her much-maligned exhibition match against Nick Kyrgios had paid dividends as she demolished Cristina Bucsa on Tuesday to launch her Australian Open preparations.
The world number one took just 48 minutes to dispose of the Spaniard 6-0, 6-1 in the second round of the season-opening Brisbane International.
The ease of the win against the world number 50 will send a warning to the Belarusian’s rivals ahead of the Australian Open starting January 18.
She raced through the first set in just 22 minutes and took only 26 minutes to claim the second against an opponent who had no answer to the power of the 27-year-old.
Sabalenka said the fact that she played so well in her first match of the season showed that the December 28 exhibition in Dubai against the mercurial but controversial Kyrgios was worthwhile.
“I mean, when you play against a guy, the intensity is completely different,” she said.
“Especially when there is Nick, who is drop-shotting every other shot, so you move a lot, so there was a great fitness for me.
“And today I was, like, whew, let’s move around, you know.
“That exhibition, it was fun. It was a great challenge,” she added.
“I think we brought so many eyes on tennis. It wasn’t about proving something to anyone, it was able to show that tennis can be really huge.”
Sabalenka will now play either Jelena Ostapenko or Sorana Cirstea in the third round and remains on track to meet Madison Keys in the quarter-finals in a rematch of last year’s Australian Open final, won by the American.
Keys reached the Brisbane third round with a 6-4, 6-3 win over fellow American McCartney Kessler.
Like Sabalenka, Keys had a bye into the second round and said she had found it tough to find her rhythm early on.
“I think it’s sometimes a little bit harder when the person you’re playing has already played a match, and then you’re kind of trying to still knock off a bit of the rust,” she said.
“I felt like it took a little bit just to find my rhythm, but I feel like once I did it, I kind of settled in a little bit better.”
There were two major upsets in the men’s draw with second-seeded Spaniard Alejandro Davidovich Fokina and Canada’s fifth seed, Denis Shapovalov both losing.
American Brandon Nakashima downed Davidovich Fokina 7-6 (7/4), 6-4 while Belgian qualifier Raphael Collignon beat Shapovalov 6-4, 6-2.