Kim Clijsters began the buildup to the defence of her Australian Open title as the Belgian reached the second round of the Brisbane International with a 6-1, 6-4 defeat of Romanian Simona Halep on Sunday. Clijsters led fellow seed Francesca Schiavone, the number three, into New Year's Day wins, with the Italian advancing when her opponent Kazak Ksenia Pervak retired at 4-4.
Daniela Hantuchova scored the first upset of 2012, defeating eighth seed and fellow Slovak Dominika Cibulkova 3-6, 6-4, 6-3. Czech Iveta Benesova beat compatriot Lucie Safarova 2-6, 7-5, 7-5 while Serbian Bojana Jovanovski eliminated Australian Casey Dellacqua 6-4, 6-2.
In men's play on the ATP side, Australian James Duckworth took the best possible advantage of his wild card entry by posting a defeat of Frenchman Nicolas Mahut, 6-4, 6-4.
Ukrainian Alexandr Dolgopolov, who spent most of December in Australia and reached the Open quarter-finals 12 months ago, started with a victory over Colombia's Alejandro Falla 7-6 (7-3), 6-2, breaking five times. Despite winning the Melbourne title to run her Grand Slam haul to four, Clijsters went through a hard-luck 2011 season, suffering with abdominal and ankle injuries and able to play in only 30 matches.
The Brisbane start was her first since an opening loss in Canada in August. The 28-year-old currently stands 13th and will next face the winner from Austrian Tamira Paszek and fellow former number one Ana Ivanovic.
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