Nara given scare by qualifier Linette

KurumiNara - Cropped

Polish qualifier Magda Linette gave Kurumi Nara a scare at the Malaysian Open on Wednesday, before the sixth seed progressed in three sets.

Exactly 60 ranking places separated sixth seed Nara from Linette going into their first career meeting, but the Japanese was made to work hard for her 7-5 5-7 7-6 (8-6) victory.

In a narrow first set, Nara had the better of the five breaks of serve before Linette held firm to level in the second - saving two match points in the 10th game.

Linette built up a 5-1 lead in the final set tie-break but Nara showed her quality to win seven of the final eight points and seal victory after three hours and 13 minutes on court.

Eight seed Julia Goerges enjoyed a much simpler time of it, converting five of 10 break points on her way to a 6-1 6-2 victory over Kateryna Kozlova.

Having broken Kozlova five times in total on her way to a routine victory, Goerges will face China's Duan Ying-ying next in her bid to win a first WTA singles title since 2011.

Australia's Jarmila Gajdosova is also through, with the fourth seed making the most of five double faults to beat Luksika Kumkhum 7-5 6-2 and reach the third round, where she will face fellow seed Nara.

Qualifier Elizaveta Kulichkova mainatined her strong start to the tournament as she recorded a dominant 6-0 6-2 win against Yulia Putintseva in just over an hour.

Kulichkova - who knocked out seventh seed Bojana Jovanovski in the first round - will face Hsieh Su-wei or Misa Eguchi next while Duan was beaten 6-4 6-1 by Alexandre Dulgheru.

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