Jankovic survives tough opener

The 22-year-old, who came into the tournament with a thigh injury sustained during the Hopman Cup in Perth last week, needed just over three hours to beat little-known Austrian Tamira Paszek 2-6 6-2 12-10 in a match in which she came from 4-1 down in the deciding set and saved three match points.

Jankovic's struggle was in stark contrast to the dominance of defending champion Serena Williams and world number one Justin Henin, who both progressed in straight sets.

Williams downed newly naturalised Australian Jarmila Gajdosova 6-3 6-3 while Henin had little trouble eliminating Japan's Aiko Nakamura 6-2 6-2.

But comeback mum Lindsay Davenport needed three sets to beat Italy's Sara Errani 6-2 3-6 7-5.

However, it was Jankovic's epic battle against Paszek - a 17-year-old who was playing just her fifth Grand Slam tournament after cutting her ranking from 365 to 42 in just two years - that was the stand-out match on day one.

There were eight successive breaks of serve in the final set as Paszek had five failed opportunities to serve out the match.

Other first round winners on day one included Australia's Jessica Moore in a rare success for the local women as well as Romania's Edina Gallovits, China's Meng Yuan, Germany's Angelique Kerber, Russia's Olga Poutchkova, American Jill Craybas and France's Aravane Rezai.

Other seeded women to advance included Russian number 11 seed Elena Dementieva, 13th seeded Tatiana Golovin of France, Israel's number 17 seed Shahar Peer and number 26 seed Victoria Azarenka of Belarus.