The inaugural day of the China Open WTA tournament was hit by persistent rain as only one match on schedule was finished in Beijing at the Beijing Tennis Center on Monday.

The headlined first round match between Swiss Martina Hingis and local favorite Sun Tiantian has been delayed until Tuesday.

While newly-paired Yan Zi/Peng Shuai from China also had to wait one more day to finish their midway game against Sophie Lefevre from France and Agnes Szatmari of Romania as the match was suspended due to rain when the Chinese pair were leading 4-1 in the opening set.

And since then, the rain has been nonstop, forcing the organizers to cancel all the matches and making a busy order of play for Tuesday.

However, more rain has been forecast to fall down Tuesday and the temperature is expected to drop sharply.

Early in the afternoon, Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia overcame a second set slump to beat Denmark's Caroline Wozniacki 6-0, 6-7(5) , 6-1 before clouds started to gather in the skies.

(Xinhua News Agency September 18, 2007)