Sania shown doors; Sunitha enters third round

Birmingham, Jun 11 (UNI) India's Sania Mirza did not have a memorable come back as Marina Erakovic of New Zealand inflicted a straight-set defeat on her while her compatriot Sunitha Rao put up a brave fight against local girl Naomi Cavadayto to enter the third round of 200,000 dollars WTA DFS Classic here today.

After being a set down, Sunitha fought back to pull off a 4-6, 6-3, 6-1 win against the wild card Naomi in the Tier III grass court event.

Sunitha will now face the winner of the match between Ukraine's Alona Bondarenko and Spain's Virginia Ruano Pascual.

Meanwhile, Sania failed to pose any challenge to Erakovic as she went down 3-6, 0-6 in a one-sided contest in just an hour.

Seeded sixth in the tournament, Sania was given a bye in the first round and this was the first match she was playing after a three-month long injury lay-off. She was also forced to pull out of the French Open due to a wrist injury soon after the Australian Open.

Trailing 5-2 in the first set, Sania fought back but a chance to break back in the eighth game was given away when Erakovic grabbed four points to seal the first set.

From there on Sania looked in all sorts of trouble and dropped her serve in the very first game of the second set.

She then continued her poor performance and lost the set without winning a single game.

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