Sania Mirza had a winning start with her partner Bethanie Mattek-Sands to clinch a 4-6, 6-4, 10-7 win over Anna-Lena Groenfeld and Kveta Peschke in the women's doubles final of the $1 million Brisbane International tennis championship in Brisbane on Saturday evening, according to information received.
The star Indian player and her partner looked good at the start of the first set when they took a comfortable 4-1 lead at one stage only to concede later five games in-a-row to lose the set.
However, Sania and Mattek, according to her father-cum-coach Imran Mirza who is there with the player, broke in the eighth game of the second set to lead 5-3 only to see German duo fight back well. However, keeping cool under pressure and stepping up the net-play, Sania and her partner wrapped up the second set to take the issue into the decider.
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In the super tie-break, Sania and Mattek took a 9-5 lead before closing it out at 10-7 to emerge a deserving winner. The victory is all the more creditable given the fact that the German duo had earlier beaten the world champions and top-seeded pair of Sara Errani and Vinci of Italy in the semi-final yesterday.
A visibly delighted Sania, who picked her 15th title of her career, later commented that she could not have asked for a better start to this year and that this result should lift the confidence level ahead of the more challenge Australian Open Grand Slam.
"It is great to see Mattek peak at the right time despite the discomfort she faced before the start of the semi-final two days ago," the champion tennis player from India pointed out.
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Sania and Mattek earned 470 ranking points each and shared $51,022 as prize money.