PARIS (Reuters) - Simona Halep overcame a second-set blip as she kicked off her French Open title defence with a 6-2 3-6 6-1 win over Australian Ajla Tomljanovic to reach the second round on Tuesday.
The Romanian third seed played some neat and tidy tennis in the opening set, lost the plot in the second and then wrapped up the victory to set up a meeting with Magda Linette of Poland.
Halep seized control with an early break and tightened her grip in a one-sided first set, containing her opponent's power.
But Tomljanovic started to hit the ball harder and by the time Halep had started to figure out how to deal with her pace the Australian had taken the second set.
Experience, however, prevailed in the decider as Halep won six of the seven remaining games.
(Reporting by Julien Pretot; Editing by Ken Ferris)