Maria Sharapova dumped out of Brisbane International as Naomi Osaka and Petra Kvitova battle through
Five-time Grand Slam winner Maria Sharapova has been dumped out of her first tournament in 2020 as she was beaten 3-6 6-1 7-6 (3) by American Jennifer Brady at the Brisbane International.
The Russian, who won the tournament back in 2015, started well as she broke early on to take the opening set 6-3.
But her 24-year-old opponent hit back to dominate the second set 6-1 and force the match to a decider.
And after both players served well to send the match to a crucial tie-break, Sharapova lost two points on her serve at 3-4 as Brady claimed an early season upset.
Elsewhere, world No 3 Naomi Osaka made it through to the second round despite being forced to a third set against Greece's Maria Sakkari.
After comfortably taking the first set 6-2, the 2019 Australian Open champion was outplayed in a second set tie-break as Sakkari began to find her rhythm.
But, after losing her serve in the opening game of the decider, Osaka fought back from 2-0 to win five of the next six games and seal the victory 6-2 6-7 (4) 6-3.
Petra Kvitova was another seeded player to be given a scare in her first match of 2020 against Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova.
The two-time Wimbledon winner recovered superbly from losing the first set 6-2 to annihilate her Russian counterpart in the resulting two sets, dropping just one game on her way to a 2-6 6-1 6-0 victory.
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