LONDON -- French Open champion Garbine Muguruza was extended to three sets before she won her first-round match at Wimbledon on Monday.
The second-seeded Spaniard beat Camila Giorgi of Italy 6-2, 5-7, 6-4 on Centre Court in a match that lasted more than 2½ hours.
The match was effectively decided in the third game of the final set, which lasted more than 10 minutes and included five deuces and six break points. The game ended with Muguruza breaking for a 2-1 lead when Giorgi hit a forehand into the net.
The players stayed on serve the rest of the way, with Muguruza serving out the match at love.
The 22-year-old Spaniard, who lost in last year's Wimbledon final to Serena Williams, said the tight contest would help her for the rest of the tournament.
"I like to play tough matches," she said. "It puts me more into the tournament and gives me more confidence."
Five-time champion Venus Williams, meanwhile, had a stiff test in her opening match, overcoming Donna Vekic of Croatia 7-6 (3), 6-4 to win a first-round match at the All England Club for the 17th time.
The 20-year-old Vekic, who was just a year old when Williams, 36, made her Wimbledon debut in 1997, had two set points in the first set serving at 6-5 but blew them both on errors. Williams ran through the tiebreaker.
In the second set, Vekic had a break chance for 5-3 but squandered it with another unforced error.
Williams, the oldest woman in the draw, broke for 5-4 and served out in her 19th Wimbledon, a record among active players.
"I felt like I couldn't hit a winner against her today, she ran everything down and played amazing tennis," Williams said. "The first set, there were some hairy moments there, down some set points, but I guess that's where experience sets in. I started to feel like maybe I had the chance to win the most important points."
Williams' career has been slowed in recent years by Sjogren's syndrome, a condition that can cause joint pain and saps energy.
"You only live once," she said. "You have to enjoy, do it while you're fairly young, and I guess somehow I'm still fairly young. You just have to live in the moment, and when it's over, it's over."
Former No. 1 Ana Ivanovic blamed an injured right wrist for causing her problems during a surprising 6-2, 7-5 loss against 21-year-old Russian qualifier Ekaterina Alexandrova, who is ranked 223rd and making her Grand Slam debut.
Ivanovic, the 2008 French Open champion who was seeded 23rd at the All England Club, called the exit "disappointing" but said her wrist had been bothering her for two weeks. She said she plans to take time off and not play until representing Serbia at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics in August.
"It was very hard to accelerate on my forehand," Ivanovic said. "I tried to do everything possible to be fit and recover and tape it and so on. But, yeah, it was a little bit sore. I feel like it caused me a lot of mis-hits. My forehand was hard to control her fast shots."
Ivanovic was a 2007 semifinalist at Wimbledon but has not made it past the fourth round since then, including second-round exits in 2013 and last year.
No. 4 Angelique Kerber, No. 5 Simona Halep, No. 9 Madison Keys, No. 12 Carla Suarez Navarro, No. 14 Samantha Stosur and former finalist Sabine Lisicki.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.