Kim Clijsters' father dies at 52 from cancer

Lei Clijsters, the father of Kim Clijsters and a former soccer player for Belgium, has died on Sunday. He was 52.

Lei has died after a year of battling with lung cancer, the Derniere Heure newspaper has reported.

He played 40 matches for Belgium's national soccer team, and he participated in the 1986 and the 1990 World Cup.

He was also captain of the FC Mechelen when it won the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1988 to Ajax in the final.

After retiring in 1993, Clijsters was his daughter's tennis manager until 2007 when Kim retired.

2009 season starts with pleasing results in Brisbane

The top seeds at Brisbane showed their preparation was good enough for the new season, as they won their matches easily.

No. 2 seed Victoria Azarenka and No. 3 seed Marion Bartoli both won their matches in straight sets, as the Bulgarian won her match to Kateryna Bondarenko 60 62, and the Frenchwoman won her match to wildcard Monika Wejnert 61 62.

"It was not an easy match, she was playing really well and she obviously had nothing to lose," observed Bartoli after clinching victory 61 62 on her third match point. "It was her first match on the WTA tour and playing against me was not easy for her, and this being her home town, it was normal that she was nervous.

"She's really talented so I had to play a good match, a solid match, but I did and it was pretty good to start like that," Bartoli added.

But one of the seeds were kicked out. That was No. 6 seed Kaia Kanepi, who fell to Alisa Kleybanova of Russia, 61 64.

Other winners of the day were Tsvetana Pironkova, who defeated Monica Niculescu 67(2) 64 64, and Jarmila Gajdosova, who demolished Shuai Peng in straight sets, 64 62.

Top seed Ivanovic will make her debut on Monday, as she will take on Petra Kvitova.

Cornet wins in Hopman Cup

Alize Cornet overcame fatigue to demolish Hsieh Su-Wei in straight sets, 64 64, along with Gilles Simon from the ATP, to beat Taiwan in the Hopman Cup.

Both the Frenchwoman and the Taiwanese player had problems with their serve in the first set, as Hsieh went 0/4 for break point chances. Cornet succeeded only once in five times, when she broke Hsieh at 4-4 to make it 5-4 on her serve, then she went on to win the set with an ace.

Then Cornet and Simon won the mixed doubles together to Hsieh and Lu Yen-Hsun from the ATP, 63 76(8), to make the score 3-0 for France to win.

The defending champions are Meghann Shaughnessy and James Blake from the US, and they will take on Slovakia on Monday.

The U.S, Slovakia, Germany and Australia are in Group A, while France, Taiwan, Italy and Russia are in Group B.

Sharapova tops athlete search on Yahoo! for 2008

Even though Maria Sharapova missed half of the season due to a shoulder injury, she still was ranked No. 1 as the most searched athlete of 2008.

The 21-year-old Russian achieved a Grand Slam at the Australian Open last year, along with winning 22 out of 23 of her first matches.

Check out the Top Ten list on www.mariasharapova.com