Melbourne: Lleyton Hewitt was bundled out of the Australian Open on Tuesday after losing his first round match to Chile's Fernando Gonzalez 5-7, 6-2 6-2, 3-6, 6-3.
It was Hewitt's first opening round defeat at the Australian Open since 2002, when had was struck down by chicken pox.
The Australian, a finalist at Melbourne Park four years ago, slipped down the rankings last year after undergoing hip surgery and only returned to competition this month.
Gonzalez, who made the Australian Open final in 2007, looked to have the match under control when he won the second and third sets but started to tire the longer the match went on and needed a medical timeout in the deciding fifth set.
No 5 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga beat Argentina's Juan Monaco 6-4, 6-4, 6-0, No 6 Gilles Simon beat Spain's Pablo Andujar 6-4, 6-1, 6-1. Fellow Frenchman Richard Gasquet, seeded 24th, advanced in four sets over Diego Junqueira.
No. 17 Nicolas Almagro of Spain, No. 25 Ivo Karlovic of Croatia, and No. 31 Jurgen Melzer of Austria also got through. Melzer overpowered 19-year-old Japanese player Kei Nishikori 7-5, 6-2, 6-1.
Tsonga had upset wins over then-No. 9 Andy Murray in the first round and Rafael Nadal in the semi-finals in Melbourne last year before losing the final to Novak Djokovic.
Rafael Nadal had a night match Tuesday against Christophe Rochus of Belgium, about the same time No. 9 James Blake is due to play Canada's Frank Dancevic.
In the women's section 2006 champion Amelie Mauresmo of France and No. 22 Zheng Jie of China advanced into the second round.
Mauresmo (20) defeated Olga Govortsova of Belarus 6-4, 6-3 while Zheng (22), knocked out Frace’s Camille Pin 6-3, 6-3.
No. 9 Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland went down to Ukraine's Kateryna Bondarenko 7-6 (7), 4-6, 6-1. She was the highest of the seeded players to fall so far. Also advancing was No. 13 Victoria Azarenka of Belarus.
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