DUBAI: Coco Gauff had trouble closing out and needed to save two match points before finally fending off Ekaterina Alexandrova 7-6 (3), 2-6, 7-6 (8) on Sunday to advance to the second round of the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championship.

The 16-year-old American led 5-1 in the third set and twice had chances to serve out the match, holding four match points in the 10th game, but Alexandrova rallied toforce a tiebreaker.

Gauff then had to save match points in the tiebreaker before winning the last three points to finish off the match in 2 hours, 40 minutes.

Gauff`s 17th birthday is next Saturday, the same day as the Dubai final.

`That`d be a pretty good birthday gift, to make it to the final,` she said.

The top eight seeds had a first-round bye.

In other matches on Sunday, Ons Jabeur opened with a 6-2, 6-3 win over Katerina Siniakova and Barbora Krejcikova upset 16th-seeded Maria Sakkari 6-2, 7-6 (4).

Veteran Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova had a 6-4, 1-6, 6-5 win over Wang Qiang and advanced to the second round along with Anastasija Sevastova and Alize Cornet.-AP