Victoria Azarenka lined up a second round encounter with two-time defending champion Elina Svitolina at the Italian Open, following a comfortable 6-2, 6-1 victory over Zhang Shuai of China. Zhang had no answer to the former world number one's powerful groundstrokes and was swept away in just 68 minutes. Azarenka holds a 2-0 advantage over Svitolina in terms of their head-to-head record, but both of her victories took place on hard surfaces and happened back in 2015.