Tamara Korpatsch came up with the shot of the day on Tuesday at the Ningbo Open.

En route to a 6-2, 7-6(1) first-round defeat of Jodie Burrage, Korpatsch had to withstand a drop shot, a lob, a thudding forehand and then a drive volley from the British qualifier -- all in one rally.

The No.107-ranked German handled all of the above with aplomb, before finishing with a fizzing backhand winner on the line.

Claire Liu was also the exponent of a pair of breathtaking plays, pulling off a pair of full-stretch passing shots against No.3 seed Sorana Cirstea. But the American couldn't convert them into victory, squandering a break lead in the third set and falling to Cirstea 7-5, 4-6, 6-3.

Elsewhere in first-round action, Kamilla Rakhimova overturned a 6-3, 4-0 deficit and saved two match points -- both with clean winners -- to defeat No.6 seed Arantxa Rus 3-6, 7-6(5), 6-3. No.1 seed Ons Jabeur edged out the one-handed backhand of Diane Parry 7-6(3), 7-5, and Nadia Podoroska halted Guangzhou champion Wang Xiyu's five-match winning streak 7-6(3), 6-4. Podoroska had in fact lost to Wang in the first round of Guangzhou one week previously.

Photos: All of 2023's winners from match point down

No.164-ranked Valeria Savinykh, 32, continued her finest sequence of results in a decade with a 7-5, 7-5 upset of No.5 seed Varvara Gracheva. Two weeks ago in Osaka, Savinykh had notched her first tour-level win since the 2013 Australian Open; this result was her first defeat of a Top 50 opponent since beating Dominika Cibulkova at that tournament.

Highlights: The best of the Ningbo Open first round

Jabeur d. Parry
Rakhimova d. Rus
Podoroska d. Wang Xiyu
Cirstea d. Liu
Shnaider d. Bai
Savinykh d. Gracheva
Baindl d. Yuan
Kvitova d. Friedsam
Zvonareva d. Boulter
Bronzetti d. Teichmann
Tauson d. Avanesyan