Kvitova crashes early again

Petra Kvitova's Australian Open preparations suffered another blow when she crashed to Dominika Cibulkova in the Sydney International.

The fifth seed's first round hammering 6-1 6-1 comes hot on the heels of her second round defeat in Brisbane earlier in the week.

World number 15 Cibulkova took less than an hour to defeat the Czech, whose current form appears to be some way below when she won Wimbledon in 2011.

"I played really badly and I wish I knew what I could say but I don't know," Kvitova said.

"I'm not feeling very well right now, in my confidence, but I'm always looking forward to playing grand slams and I hope everything will be better there than here."

There were no such problems for seventh seed Caroline Wozniacki who overcame Urszula Radwanska 6-1 6-2.

The former world number one lost her first round match in Brisbane and was relieved to earn some practice time ahead of Melbourne.

"It was quite hot out there, especially towards the end of the second set you could really feel it was starting to heat up," said the Dane.

"I'm just happy to get the first win of the season under my belt and just move on.

"The most important thing is that you're healthy and I'm going to play as best I can and win as many tournaments as I can and the ranking will come if you play well."

Russia's Maria Kirilenko also posted a win, overcoming Australian wild card Olivia Rogowska 7-5 6-2 to progress to the second round.