Clijsters wary about ankle injury
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MELBOURNE, Australia (Reuters) -- Belgium's Kim Clijsters faces a nervous wait to see whether she can continue playing at the Australian Open after her 6-3 6-2 win over Germany's Marlene Weingaertner in the first round.
While Clijsters showed no ill-effects of the ankle injury that forced her to pull out of the Hopman Cup and Sydney International tournaments earlier this month, the world number two says she is unsure how the injury will respond in the next 24 hours.
"It's not like it's healed, it's something that's not going to go away," said Clijsters, who is scheduled to play Italy's Maria Elena Camerin in the second round on Thursday.
"The problem is still there. The swelling has gone down but the only thing I'm worried about now is to see how it flares up tomorrow after having played this match.
"My main goal is to try and ice it as much and keep the swelling down so it doesn't flare up again for tomorrow. Hopefully it will be okay for my next round."
Clijsters first injured herself playing for Belgium at the Hopman Cup in Perth then aggravated the problem during a light practice session in Sydney.
The 20-year-old admitted she had feared she would have to skip the season's opening grand slam.
"I was very happy to be out there. I didn't really have any problems with the ankle and I think that was the most important thing, just to test it out and see how it was going," she said.
"I didn't know if I was going to be coming here as a player so I really enjoyed it out there. You sort of come with a different attitude."
Despite being able to move around the court without restriction, Clijsters was still a little rusty in her opening match.
She served five double faults and committed 27 unforced errors but still raced to victory in exactly an hour.
"I felt like I was hitting the ball very well out there," she said.
"Of course there were a few moments when my footwork wasn't at it's best but you can't expect more for your first match after a while off again."
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