Serena Williams returns with three-set win

EASTBOURNE, England, June 14 (UPI) -- Serena Williams ended her nearly yearlong layoff from tennis with a three-set victory Tuesday at the Aegon International tournament in England.

Williams, whose last competitive match was a victory in the finals of the 2010 Wimbledon Championships, staggered early before taking a 1-6, 6-3, 6-4 win over Tsvetana Pironkova.

Williams has been sidelined since last July with a series of injuries, including a foot injury suffered shortly after she won at Wimbledon.

Pironkova built a 5-0 lead in dominating the first set Tuesday, winning 64 percent of the points and cashing in both break points as Williams landed just 42 percent of her first serves and had three double faults.

But Williams was shaking off the rust by the second set, firing a pair of aces -- and no double faults -- while getting a break that evened the match. She had four more aces in the third set and had a pair of service breaks in advancing to the second round.

There she'll go against top-seeded Vera Zvonareva, who was a 6-3, 6-3 first-round winner over Heather Watson. Zvonareva, No. 3 in the world, had to deal with just one break point and won more than three-quarters of the points on serve against Watson.

No. 2-seeded Li Na took 2 hours to finish off a 7-5, 6-4 win over Tamira Paszek and fourth-seeded Francesca Schiavone topped Kaia Kanepi 7-6 (9-7), 6-1 while sixth-seeded Marion Bartoli outbattled Lucie Safarova 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 (9-7).

Unseeded winners as the first round was completed Tuesday were Bojana Jovanovski, Elena Baltacha, Ekaterina Makarova, Ana Ivanovic and Daniela Hantuchova.