'It will give me great confidence for the future,' he said. 'I took a set off Philipp and had some chances against him. Qualifying for the US Open was a great breakthrough for me and then to win a match here, it will help me get better and move up in the rankings. I will have to take the right steps, work harder and get stronger from here.'

After being blanked out by Italian Flavia Pennetta in singles second round, Sania, playing with Francesca Schiavone of Italy in doubles was in a spot of bother before winning her match against Belarussian Ekaterina Dzehalevich and Czech Renata Voracova.

But Sania and Schiavone, seeded 14th, rallied from a set down to beat Dzehalevich and Voracova 5-7, 7-5, 6-1 in a tough encounter that lasted two hour and 19 minutes.

Sania then turned up for the mixed doubles event on the same court with her new partner Daniel Nestor of Canada and took just 40 minutes to dispatch Akgul Amanmuradova of Uzbekistan and Australian Ashley Fisher 6-3, 6-1.

It was not so easy for Paes and Cara Black of Zimbabwe in their first mixed doubles match. The second seeded pair were stretched by Patty Schnyder of Switzerland and Wesley Moodie of South Africa before they survived 6-4, 3-6, 11-9 in 70 minutes.

Paes and Black will face Itallian Flavia Pennetta and Serbian Dusan Vemic in the second round.

In men's doubles third seed Bhupathi and Mark Knowles of Bahamas coasted to a 6-3, 6-4 win over James Cerretani of the US and Lovro Zovko of Croatia. They will next meet American pair Jesse Levine and Ryan Sweeting.