Serena Williams was pushed to three sets before she saw off fellow American Christina McHale to reach the third round of the Miami Open.
McHale saved a match point in the second set, taking it 7-5 to force a decider, but Williams then broke serve twice to close out a 6-3 5-7 6-2 win in two hours and seven minutes.
Williams said in her on-court interview: “She definitely started to fight harder, and is clearly capable of playing great tennis. She showed it today.
“Miami is such a special place for me. I grew up wandering the grounds like everyone here, and now I’m playing here and it’s always such a special moment.”
Her next opponent will be Zarina Diyas, after the world number 97 from Kazakhstan upset 31st seed Daria Gavrilova 7-5 6-3.
Gavrilova was not the only seed to drop out, with 11th seed Lucie Safarova the highest-ranked casualty as she lost 6-2 6-3 to Belgium’s Yanina Wickmayer.
Andrea Petkovic was beaten 7-6 (7/5) 3-6 7-6 (7/2) by France’s Caroline Garcia while Sam Stosur also suffered a three-set defeat, 3-6 6-1 6-4 to Germany’s Julia Goerges.
Anna Karolina Schmiedlova lost 7-5 6-4 to Madison Brengle and most emphatically, 20th-seed Sloane Stephens was hammered 6-3 6-0 by Great Britain’s Heather Watson.
Third seed Agnieszka Radwanska had no such trouble, brushing aside France’s Alize Cornet 6-0 6-1, while Simona Halep beat Daria Kasatkina 6-3 7-5 and Petra Kvitova won 6-1 6-4 against Irina Falconi.
Caroline Wozniacki, Ana Ivanovic and Elina Svitolina had straight-sets wins over Vania King, Teliana Pereira and Zhang Shuai respectively. There were also wins for Svetlana Kuznetsova, Ekaterina Makarova and Timea Bacsinsky.
In the men’s tournament, Sergiy Stakhovsky made it through with a 7-6 (9/7) 7-5 win over Nicolas Jarry.
The Ukrainian had been embroiled in the row over equal pay for male and female players and debated the issue with Andy Murray via Twitter – but his post on the social network site after his match was less controversial as he and Rajeev Ram offered free burritos to spectators in the Key Biscayne venue’s food court.
Uzbekistan’s Denis Istomin came from a set down to beat rising star Borna Coric 4-6 7-5 7-5 and set up a clash with second seed Murray in round two.
Murray was joined in the second round by British number two Aljaz Bedene, who beat Spain’s Roberto Carballes Baena 4-6 6-2 6-3.
Adrian Mannarino won in three sets against Illya Marchenko and fellow Frenchman Pierre-Hugues Herbert earned an impressive win over Lukas Rosol, but Paul-Henri Mathieu and Nicolas Mahut lost to Santiago Giraldo and Tatsuma Ito respectively.
Marcos Baghdatis beat Benjamin Becker 6-3 6-4 to set up a clash with the similarly combustible Nick Kyrgios.
Stakhovsky will play American Jack Sock in the next round while in the same section of the draw another home player, Denis Kudla, beat Hyeon Chung in three sets to earn a clash with Milos Raonic.
Donald Young lost 6-3 6-1 to Andreas Seppi, Brian Baker was beaten by Mikhail Kukushkin and Tim Smyczek won the all-American clash with fellow qualifier Tommy Paul.
There were also wins for Damir Dzumhur, Andrey Kuznetsov, John Millman and Federico Delbonis.
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