Fourth seeds Hsieh Su-wei and Flavia Pennetta overcame another slow start in the first round of the women’s doubles at the French Open on Thursday to advance to the second round.
The Taiwanese-Italian duo recovered after losing the first set to defeat French pairing Clothilde De Bernardi and Sherazad Reix 6-7 (6/8), 6-2, 6-1 on Court 10 at Roland Garros.
Hsieh and Pennetta, who won 99 of 176 points, saved four of six break-point opportunities and converted six of 11 to advance to a second-round match against Madison Brengle of the US and Tatjana Maria of Germany, who defeated Wang Yafan of China and Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium 6-3, 6-4 in their first-round match.
Photo: AP
Also advancing to the second round were Chan Yung-jan and Zheng Jie of China, who had a fairly comfortable 6-4, 6-1 victory over Gabriela Dabrowski of Canada and Alicja Rosolska of Poland.
While Dabrowski and Rosolska converted the only break-point chance they created, the cross-strait duo converted five of 12, winning 62 of the 101 points contested.
Chan and Zheng next face Annika Beck of Germany and Shahar Peer of Israel, who overcame Czech pairing Klara Koukalova and Tereza Smitkova 7-5, 6-4.
Chan also prevailed in the first round of the mixed doubles with Australian John Peers, defeating her younger sister, Chan Hao-ching, and Marin Draganja of Croatia 6-3, 6-4 on Court Eight.
The Taiwanese-Australian duo saved two of the three break-points they faced and converted three of seven to advance to a second-round match against Anna-Lena Groenefeld of Germany and Jean-Julien Rojer of the Netherlands after they stunned top seeds Sania Mirza of India and Bruno Soares of Brazil 6-2, 6-2.
It was not good news for Lu Yen-hsun in the second round of the men’s singles, though, as the Taiwanese No. 1 was beaten 5-7, 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 by 15th seed Kevin Anderson of South Africa.
Anderson served up 21 aces and hit 64 winners as he rallied from a set down to edge Lu and advance to a third-round clash against 20th seed Richard Gasquet of France.
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