Ankita Raina and Serbia's Barbara Bonic, playing for the first time together, rallied to beat Chinese wild cards Xinyu Gao and Xiaodi You to progress to the doubles quarterfinals of the USD 50000 ITF Women's event, here today.
The unseeded Indo-Serbian combo prevailed 6-7(7) 6-1 10-8 in the opening round of the hard court event at Shaanxi Tennis Centre.
Ankita and Barbara were trailing 1-3 in the opening set but regrouped well, using their experience of playing at this level and found themselves serving for the set after saving a set point in the 11th game, but Barbara dropped her serve in the next.
The second set belonged to the Indian and her partner as they cruised to level the match.
In the Super Tie-breaker, they raced to a 4-1 lead and sealed the match on their third match point.
"This is first time I am playing with Barbara, so I am happy that we pulled it off and began on a winning note," Ankita said.
"The Chinese were solid. They were wild cards but worth playing at this level," the 21-year old added.
Ankita will open her singles campaign tomorrow against Chinese wild card Mingyang Liu.
