Sharapova eases through

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Russian tennis player Maria Sharapova returns the ball against Canada's Stephanie Dubois in the first round of the WTA AEGON Classic Tournament at Edgbaston in Birmingham Monday.

BIRMINGHAM, Jun 9 (AFP): Former world number one Maria Sharapova cruised into the second round of the WTA Birmingham grasscourt event here Monday with a 6-4, 6-2 win over Canada's Stephanie Dubois.
The unseeded 22-year-old Russian, twice a winner at the Edgbaston Priory Club, will now play American 19-year-old Alexa Glatch, who defeated ninth-seeded compatriot Bethanie Mattek-Sands 7-6 (7/2), 6-3.
Sharapova, a three-time Grand Slam winner, reached the quarter-finals of the French Open last week after a 10-month absence due to a shoulder injury.
It was Sharapova's first grasscourt match of the season but she raced into a 4-1 lead before surviving a break and closing out the set.
The 2004 Wimbledon champion was broken again early in the second set but hit back to break Dubois in games five and seven to complete a routine 74-minute victory.
Sharapova, who has risen to 73 in the world on the back of her French Open performance, said that she had felt right at home on the grass.