Sharapova shines

Day One of the US Open and clearly the highlight came at night with the match between second seed Simona Halep and Maria Sharapova, awarded a wild card and playing her first US Open since 2014.

A record of 6-0 head to head against Halep, including the 2014 Roland Garros final, and an astounding 17-0 when required to play on Arthur Ashe at night, would normally be enough to intimidate.

However, Halep knew that match fitness put her in front in that category at least.

From the outset, Sharapova looked exactly like the 5 time Grand Slam title winner we saw before the suspension.  Her movement was swift and smooth and she was hitting winners all over the place.  Errors came, but expected with the power game being exhibited.  

Sharapova broke the Halep serve in the fourth game, the Romanian second delivery under serious pressure.  Halep returned favour immediately and the breaks continued in the next two games, enabling Simona to hold and level in the eighth game 4-4.

Serving to stay in the set at 4-5, Simona had three game points before a double fault gave Maria a set point.  Another forehand winner sealed the set and things looked ominous for the world number two.

Worse was to come for Halep as Sharapova broke again in the fourth game and had a break point in the sixth game to lead 5-1. It was saved by Halep and precipitated a great run of five games from the second seed to steal the set from Sharapova 6-4 and keep the match very alive.

Sharapova steadied and raced to 3-0 in the decider.  She kept the advantage for the remainder of set three, with no further service breaks.  The only break point Sharapova faced in the set was 30-40 when serving for the match. An unforced error from Halep saw that opportunity disappear.

Sharapova ultimately served out the match in two and three quarter hours 6-4 4-6 6-3. 

Hard to recall a higher quality first round match at Grand Slam level.

To illustrate just how the match was on Sharapova's racquet, she hit 60 winners and 64 unforced errors - Halep 15 winners and 14 errors.  Halep displayed terrific resolve, saving 17 of the 22 break points that Sharapova had at her disposal.

A big blow for Halep's chances of grabbing the world number one spot. 

Garbine Muguruza is the biggest threat to Karolina Pliskova's tenuous hold on the top spot should her form hold.

The number three seed and Wimbledon champ easily won her first round match against luckless Varvara Lepchenko 6-0 6-3.

Other seeds to progress were :

Caroline Wozniacki (5), Venus Williams (9), Dominika Cibulkova (11), Petra Kvitova (13), Anastasija Sevastova (16), Caroline Garcia (18), Shuai Peng (22), Mirjana Lucic-Baroni (29), Julia Goerges (30) and Magdalena Rybarikova (31).

Ousted were:

Johanna Konta (7) in a huge upset, losing to 78th ranked Serb player Aleksandra Krunic.

Ana Konjuh (21) after winning the opening set, lost 11 of the next 12 games to Ash Barty

Kiki Bertens (24) downed by Maria Sakkari, ranked 95.

Lauren Davis (32) surprised by fellow American Sofia Kenin, ranked 139.

Three Australian women played and won their matches, but of the four Aussie men, three will pick up first round losers cheques - Bernard Tomic, Thanasi Kokkinakis (after leading Janko Tipsarevic.two sets to love) and John-Patrick Smith.

One stood out, and in a big way - Jordan Thompson repeated his Davis Cup achievement and defeated the crowd favourite, 13th seed Jack Sock,

After taking the first two sets (the second set tie break lasting 26 points) Jordan suffered a Sock in the mouth as the American raced through set three 6-1.

The Australian battled back and held two match points on Sock's serve at 4-5 in set four.

These were saved and the 13th seed won that and the next two games to level at 2 sets apiece.

The final set appeared to belong to Thompson when he broke the Sock serve in the fourth game. Sock fixed that immediately and dismantled the next two Thompson service games to lead 4-3 with his delivery to come.

Not to be outdone, the Aussie levelled and then held to be one game away from round two.

Three unforced Sock errors gave Thompson two match points - the second was converted into a terrific hard fought victory and heartbreak for Jack Sock and the crowd. 6-2 7-6 (12) 1-6 5-7 6-4.

Other seeds to fall were:

David Ferrer (21) to Mikhail Kukushkin

Karen Khachanov (25) to Yen-Hsun Lu

Robin Haase (32) to Kyle Edmund

Mischa Zverev (23) was down two sets to one against Thai-Son Kwiatkowski, ranked 710, before escaping in five sets.

Albert Ramos-Vinolas (20) also had a scare, going the five set distance against Denis Istomin, winning a fifth set tie break.

Roger and Rafa headline Day Two, together with Karolina Pliskova, Grigor Dimitrov, Madison Keys, Nick Kyrgios, Angie Kerber and Elina Svitolina