Sania storms into French Open 2nd round

Paris, May 30 (UNI) Sania Mirza registered her first French Open singles win by decimating Alberta Brianti of Italy 6-1, 6-1 in the first round here today.

Sania, who had lost in the opening round in her two earlier attempts in 2005 and 2006 here, needed 52 minutes to steamroll the lower-ranked Italian.

In the second round, she now runs into seventh seed Ana Ivanovic of Serbia who thrashed Sofia Arvidsson of Sweden 6-2, 6-0 in another opening round match.

The 20-year-old Hyderabadi, ranked 50th now, seemed to have left behind her woeful run of form in singles which had seen her fail to get past the first round in Morocco and Istanbul in the run up to the second Grand Slam of the year.

Sania controlled the tie from the very beginning and broke her opponent, ranked 37 places below her, twice in the first set to take it in 25 minutes.

In the second set also, Sania seized the initiative immediately breaking her opponent's serve in the first and third games and took four points on the trot.

The Italian held her third serve in the fifth game to make it 1-4 but Sania won the next two games to take the second set 6-1 in 27 minutes.

In the doubles, Sania and her new partner Eva Birnerova of Czech Republic will play against top seeded American-Aussie duo of Lisa Raymond and Samantha Stosur in first round while in mixed doubles she pairs up with Fabrice Santoro of France against German pair of Anna-Lena Groenefeld and Alexander Waske.

Sania has been in sublime form in doubles in the previous two weeks, having won in Morocco partnering Vania King of USA before finishing runners-up in Istanbul pairing with Chan Yu-Jung of Chinese Taipei.

UNI