British No 2 Heather Watson also beaten to end home hopes in Birmingham
Tuesday 19 June 2018 19:42, UK
Johanna Konta suffered a first-round defeat to fourth seed and double Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova at the Nature Valley Classic.
Just two days after losing the Nottingham Open final to Ashleigh Barty, the British No 1 paid the price for her drop in ranking by drawing the defending champion in Birmingham and lost a close contest 6-3 6-4.
Konta followed Watson in exiting the tournament at the first hurdle. Watson lost a keenly contested affair to Ukraine's Lesia Tsurenko 7-6 7-5.
As for Konta, she missed out on the chance to build on the weekend's upturn in form but can take positives from a strong showing against Kvitova who has been enjoying a stellar season.
Having lost the first set, Konta improved in the second but failed to capitalise on two break-point chances at 4-3 and that proved pivotal as Konta served up back-to-back double faults to drop serve in the following game.
Kvitova made no mistake serving it out and advances to face Daria Gavrilova in the second round while Konta's final warm-up for Wimbledon will be at Eastbourne next week where she enjoyed a run to the last four last year.
Wimbledon champion and top seed Garbine Muguruza had no trouble easing into the second round with a 6-1 6-2 victory over Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova while second seed Elina Svitolina was a 6-1 3-6 6-1 winner against Donna Vekic.
Coverage from the ATP Tour continues from Germany this week where Roger Federer defends the Gerry Weber Open in Halle, it's live on Sky Sports Arena all week.
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