Swiss Stanislas Wawrinka won the easy way, leading a progression of the top men’s seeds into the second round on a hot first day at the Australian Open.

The eighth-seeded Wawrinka began the seeds’ day out by becoming the first man through to the second round, with David Ferrer, Tomas Berdych and Richard Gasquet all joining him by the day session’s end.

The sole significant casualty was No.12 Tommy Haas from Germany, who retired hurt against Spaniard Guillermo Garcia-Lopez trailing 7-5 5-2.

Wawrinka was leading Andrey Golubev 6-4 4-1 when the Kazakh retired with a lower leg complaint.

After spending just 65 minutes on court, Wawrinka said he would have preferred longer despite the sun.

“We never want the opponent to retire for injury but that’s what happened today,” Wawrinka said.

“I was feeling good. I think it’s one of the best starts in a grand slam if I look about my game and how I felt on court. I was moving well, playing strong.”

Wawrinka’s reward is a second round meeting with Colombian Alejandro Falla, a four-set winner.

Ferrer’s 6-3 6-4 6-4 win over Alejandro Gonzalez was not as straight forward as the score suggested, with the world No.3 broken five times during the match.

Ferrer was unperturbed at the nature of his win, which takes him to a second-round date with Frenchman Adrian Mannarino.

“Today, maybe I didn’t play my best tennis but I won. That’s important,” he said.

In contrast, Czech seventh seed Tomas Berdych’s serve was supreme through a 6-3 6-4 6-3 win over Aleksandr Nedovyesov.

Berdych lost just 13 points on his serve, which hit 218km an hour, and wasn’t broken through the match.

He took the court in a striking soccer-style blue and white striped shirt, which had tennis traditionalists tut-tutting.

“It’s very nice, interesting, different than all the others that look the same,” he said.

“Let’s hope I’m going to play more and more matches that people can see it more.”

Both Ferrer and Berdych agreed the Melbourne Park courts were playing faster than last year.

The ninth-seeded Gasquet also joined the winners list by overcoming fellow Frenchman David Guez 7-5 6-4 6-1, while Russian 14th seed Mikhail Youzhny defeated German Jan-Lennard Struff 6-1 6-4 6-2.