Sania seeded top in doubles in Istanbul Cup, eighth in singles

Istanbul, May 21 (UNI) Sania Mirza has been handed second successive top billing in doubles as she and Chan Yung Jan of Chinese Taipei lead a 16-pair field in the Istanbul Cup which began here today.

Sania and Vania King of USA won the Morocco Open doubles title last week as top seeds.

In Morocco, Sania had become the first Indian to be seeded top in singles in any WTA tournament though she crashed out of the tournament in the first round.

The doubles win at Morocco saw the Hyderabadi girl jumping four places to 37th from previous week in the latest doubles individual rankings issued today.

In Istanbul, she and Chan Yung will take on Romanian pair of Sorana Cirstea and Agnes Szatmari in the first round.

Her partner in Morocco, Vania King, and Jelena Kostanic of Croatia have been seeded second.

In singles, she has been seeded eighth and handed a relatively easier first round against lower ranked Meghann Shaughnessy of USA in the 2,00,000 dollar Tier III event.

Sania, who lost one place in the latest singles rankings, will face stiffer challenge as the tournament progresses as she has been drawn in the top half along with world number two and top seed Maria Sharapova of Russia and Venus Williams of USA.

The 52nd ranked Indian has to come up with some consistent game to erase the bad memories of her first round shock loss in Morocco.

UNI