Down But Not Out
Published March 15, 2010 12:00
INDIAN WELLS, CA, USA - A couple of seeded teams were bounced from the BNP Paribas Open doubles competition over the past few days and a couple more narrowly avoided upsets.
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The most noteworthy match on the final day of first round action Friday was Natalie Grandin and Abigail Spears knocking off eighth-seeded Ekaterina Makarova and Peng Shuai, 60 64. Then on Saturday, Maria Kirilenko and Agnieszka Radwanska and Chan Yung-Jan and Zheng Jie advanced to the quarterfinals with straight set wins.
The real theatrics occurred on Sunday. Iveta Benesova and Barbora Zahlavova Strycova eliminated No.5 seeds Alisa Kleybanova and Francesca Schiavone in a match tie-break, 57 75 101, despite Kleybanova and Schiavone having three match points with Schiavone serving at 5-4 in the second set.
Meanwhile, second-seeded Nuria Llagostera Vives and María José Martínez Sánchez rallied from deficits of 5-1 in the first set and 5-3 in the second en route to a 75 76(4) defeat of Gisela Dulko and Flavia Pennetta. The Spaniards' quarterfinal opponents will be sixth-seeded Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Yan Zi, who had their own struggles on Sunday, as they blew a 4-1 lead in the second set, but managed to get past wildcards Tathiana Garbin and Jelena Jankovic in a match tie-break, 64 46 105.
