Having narrowly missed out on a place at the WTA Finals, Johanna Konta appeared in fine form as she recorded a comfortable victory over Samantha Stosur on a day of one-sided action at the WTA Elite Trophy in Zhuhai.

Konta, who recently broke into the world's top 10 for the first time but was denied a place in Singapore when Svetlana Kuznetsova triumphed at the Kremlin Cup, won the first four games of each set as she beat Stosur 6-4 6-2 on Wednesday.

The top seed said: "Against a player like Sam, who plays such a big ball and has such a big game, I really had to do my best to stay there for every single point and take my chances whenever they came."

Konta is now in pole position to qualify from the Azalea Group, which also features Caroline Garcia.

Wednesday's other contests also brought straight-sets wins, for Timea Bacsinszky and Petra Kvitova respectively.

Having been thrashed 6-1 6-1 by Zhang Shuai 24 hours earlier, Bacsinszky bounced back by dropping only six games against Timea Babos, a late addition to the Camellia Group following Carla Suarez Navarro's withdrawal through injury.

Kvitova proved far too strong for Roberta Vinci, the Czech winning 6-1 6-2 in just 47 minutes.