Melbourne, Jan 18
Tenth seed Sania Mirza and Spaniard Anabel Medina Garrigues advanced
to the second round of the Australian Open tennis here Thursday,
hours after Sania crashed out of the singles.
Sania and Anabel beat Sandra Kloesel of Germany and Aravane Rezai of
France 6-1, 6-4 in the first round match of the doubles competition.
They will now play Ekterina Bychkova of Russia and Martina Muller of
Germany in the second round.
Bychkova and Muller defeated Ukrainian Yulia Beygelzimer and Lourdes
Dominguez Lino of Spain 6-1, 6-2 in the first round.
Earlier, Sania lost 3-6, 2-6 to Japanese Aiko Nakamura in the second
round in the singles. Her defeat means she failed to emulate her
2005 feat when she reached the third round in singles.
Sania, 20, was erratic throughout in her serves against Aiko. She
committed as many as 26 double faults. The Japanese outplayed her in
just over an hour to set up a third round clash with Swiss Martina
Hingis.
"My serve was average and my forehand wasn't working," said Sania.
"The court felt like it was too small and I just couldn't put the
ball in."
Aiko seemed to have taken a lesson or two from her defeat to Sania
in the Japan Open in 2005. She was more disciplined and broke Sania
thrice in the opening set to begin with.
Sania could convert only two break points that came her way but
never looked in her element. She committed 12 unforced errors
compared to Nakamura's six before surrendering the first set in just
33 minutes.
The second set was almost a repeat of the first and Aiko gave no
chance to the world No. 53, breaking her twice.
The Indian squandered two break points and served poorly, committing
three double faults apart from 14 unforced errors to bow out of the
first Grand Slam of the year.
"I am obviously disappointed but all players have off days, although
it does hurt more because it is a Grand Slam," Sania said.
"But that is the beauty of tennis - there is always tomorrow."
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