LONDON: India's Sania Mirza won her first round match at Wimbledon on Monday, beating Anna-Lena Groenefeld of Germany 6-2, 2-6, 6-2.

World number 85 Mirza beat Groenefeld, ranked 23 places above her, in one hour, 51 minutes on Court 14.

Mirza, who has never made it past the second round at Wimbledon, now faces number 28 seed Sorana Cirstea of Romania, who beat her compatriot Edina Gallovits 7-5, 6-1 on the adjacent Court 15.

Mirza lost in the first round at the French Open, but entered the All England Club having made it to the semi-finals at Birmingham, the pre-Wimbledon grass warm-up event.

The 22-year-old won her two previous clashes with German number two Groenefeld, but they had not played each other since 2005.

Groenefeld won the toss and elected to serve. The first game went to six deuces but Mirza eventually broke when her opponent hit long.

Mirza raced into a 4-0 lead before Groenefeld held serve and broke back to make it 4-2. However, Mirza broke again and served out the first set.

The first game of the second set also went to six deuces but this time Groenefeld won the game and broke Mirza immediately afterwards.

Though Mirza broke back to make it 2-3, Groenefeld had the upper hand and won the set 6-2.

Mirza broke in the first game of the final set and went 4-1 up. The Indian held on to her service to win the set and secure a second round berth.