MELBOURNE, Australia - Six of the best doubles teams on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour made their first appearances of the week at the Australian Open on Wednesday and it was mostly a walk in the park.
The Top 3 teams in the world - Cara Black and Liezel Huber, the Williams sisters and Nuria Llagostera Vives and María José Martínez Sánchez - are seeded No.1 through No.3, respectively, and all won in straight sets.
Other seeded teams advancing were No.4 seeds Hsieh Su-Wei and Peng Shuai, No.6 seed and newly-reformed team Lisa Raymond and Rennae Stubbs and No.8 seeds Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Yan Zi.
Click here to check out the doubles draw from the Aussie Open!
There are four teams in the draw who have won here before: Black and Huber won it once (2007), the Williams sisters won it three times (2001, 2003, 2009), Raymond and Stubbs won it once (2000) and the unseeded Bondarenko sisters won it too (2008). The Bondarenkos are up against No.13 seeds Gisela Dulko and Flavia Pennetta in the first round. Alona and Kateryna are the only sister pair other than the Williams sisters to have won a doubles major together.
Check out the doubles rankings and team profiles right now!
