Novak Djokovic started his Italian Open title defence with a 6-3, 7-6(5) victory over Taylor Fritz on a rainy Tuesday in Rome, while all other existing matches, including Daniil Medvedev's match against Aslan Karatsev, have been canceled.

The most recent match between Djokovic and Fritz was a five-set struggle in the third round of the Australian Open, but Djokovic came out on top this time. The Serbian broke Fritz's first service game and made 70% of his first serves in the first set to easily shut it out.

The second set started quite similarly, with Djokovic breaking in the first game to gain early supremacy. The World No. 1 had to raise his game to save two break points at 4-3, but Fritz went for broke on Djokovic's next service game at 5-4 and was rewarded by evening out of the game. Since spending the majority of the match in rainy weather, the game was called at 5-5.

When they resumed to the court three hours later, both players kept serve effortlessly, and Djokovic won the tie-break on his first match point.

Post a third-round exit in Monte-Carlo and a semi-final run in Belgrade, Djokovic is 4-2 after earning his 17th major at the Australian Open.

Sixteenth seed Grigor Dimitrov was knocked out from the tournament in the first round on Tuesday by Spanish qualifier Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in straight sets.

The world number 48 saved two match points in the second set when he defeated Dimitrov 6-4, 7-6 (7/2) in one hour and 43 minutes.

As per the ATP, tenth seed Roberto Bautista Agut advanced to the second round with a 6-3, 6-4 victory over American Tommy Paul.

Also on the women's side, Argentinian Nadia Podoroska rated 44 in the world, defeated German Laura Siegemund 2-6, 7-6 (7/3), 6-1 to book a second-round encounter with Serena Williams, who'd been playing her first event since the Australian Open.

Madison Keys beat Sloane Stephens 4-6, 6-2, 7-5 in the fight of the Americans.

Former World No.1 Garbié Muguruza managed to win her first match against lucky loser Patricia Maria Tig, while Veronika Kudermetova started her strong clay-court season with an upset of Elise Mertens there at Internazionali BNL d'Italia.

Garbie Muguruza, the No.12 seed, tackled rain and a last-minute change of competitor move to advance to the second round of the Internazionali BNL d'Italia on Tuesday.

Muguruza triumphed over Maria: Former World No.1 Muguruza won 6-1, 6-2 over fortunate loser Patricia Maria Tig within only an hour, improving her season record to 22-6.

“It was a strange day,” Muguruza said in her post-match press interview. “I awoke to a sunny day with a competitor. Then I found out I had another rival, and it rained the whole tournament. We got a taste of everything!

“But, Rome, it's such a well-known game. I've played here quite often and I've had some great games. This red clay is my favorite. It looks familiar to me. I'm just hoping to get as many games as possible.”

Muguruza, a three-time Rome semifinalist (including last year), was scheduled to meet Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, last week's Madrid semifinalist, today, but the Russian withdrew owing to an abdominal injury.

As a result, World No.64 Tig, who lost in qualifying to Christina McHale, was pitted against Muguruza. The Romanian is an excellent clay court player, winning her first WTA singles title on the ground in Istanbul last year, but she was unable to match Muguruza that day.

Muguruza won almost 80% of the points she retrieved from Tig's first serve and transformed six of her eight break points in the match to cruise to victory. Muguruza had 20 winners to 11 unforced errors in the game, while Tig was undone by 24 unforced errors.

When the drizzle started, Muguruza seized control after an early exchange of breaks to 2-1. After taking a 4-1 lead, Muguruza held the tension on Tig with squashing groundstrokes and then used a deep return to smash him again for 5-1. Following a love service hold accentuated by an ace, Muguruza found herself raised by a set.