Top seeds Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis went through several anxious moments before getting past Russian girls Daria Kasatkina and Alexandra Panova in their opening doubles match at the French Open on Wednesday.
The reigning Wimbledon, US Open and Australian Open champions prevailed 7-6(4), 6-2.
Sixth seeds Rohan Bopanna and his Romanian partner Florin Mergea got off to a rousing start, beating the French pair of Stephane Robert and Alexandre Sidorenko 6-2, 6-2.
Sania-Martina dropped serve thrice in the match as they battled 12 break-points.
They will meet the winners of the match between Karin Knapp/Mandy Minella and Nao Hibino/Eri Hozumi.
After trading a few breaks, the pairs were level 5-5 in the opening set. The top seeds had a set point in the 12th game but the Russians did well to save it and take the set to the tie-breaker.
In the shoot-out it was the Indo-Swiss pair’s experience that prevailed.
The world No 1 team started the second set well, breaking Kasatkina-Panova in the first game, but were returned the break in the next.
However, they broke again and held serve for a 4-2 lead.
Another break set them up to serve out the match, which they did at love.
Later in the day, Leander Paes and his Polish teammate Marcin Matkowski, seeded 16th, overcame the challenge of the Belarusian-Uzbek combine Aliaksandr Bury and Denis Istomin, 7-6(3), 7-6(6).
Another Indian in the fray is Purav Raja, who has teamed up with big-serving Croat Ivo Karlovic.
They are up against ninth seeds Lukas Kubot and Alexander Peya.
In the mixed doubles, Sania has paired with Ivan Dodig and Bopanna with Russia's Alla Kudryavtseva.
Paes will partner Hingis, with whom he won three Grand Slams in the 2015 season when they skipped the French Open.
