Kolkata’s top WTA meet, the Sunfeast Open, lost its Indian shine when Sania Mirza pulled out with a wrist injury. Today it lost its top seed, Wimbledon finalist Marion Bartoli of France.

Bartoli failed to find her rhythm in the first set and though she fought back in the second, could not match the pace of US’ Vania King, losing 1-6, 5-7 in a late night match.

Earlier, twenty-two year old Sunitha Rao, ranked 211 and a crowd favourite at the Sunfeast Open here, overcame a scare from Sandy Gumulya of Indonesia today to enter the second round with a 2-6, 6-4, 6-2 win over the lucky loser.

Wild card Sunitha was slated to meet Sania in the first round and came up against Gumulya (316) after Sania pulled out. Gumulya broke the Indian in the first and third games to wrap up the first set in 34 minutes. In the second set Sunitha and Gumulya traded breaks in the fifth and sixth before holding the seventh off a great service game. Breaking through in the eighth, Sunitha was broken back immediately. She finally had the tenth game break to take the set 6-4.

That revival took the spirit out of the Indonesian. Sunitha lost her serve in the first game, but broke back in the second and then the fourth. She was again broken in the seventh, but managed to break in the eighth to win 6-2.

Yaroslava Shvedova and Alla Kudryavtseva were the two seeds to fall today.

... contd.