SPANIARD Sara Sorribes Tormo survived the fourth longest WTA Tour match in Open era history with a come-from-behind win over Chinese wildcard Gao Xinyu in an epic four-hour and 15-minute battle at the China Open in Beijing.

In what can only be described as a battle of attrition, the 104th ranked Sorribes Tormo came back from a set down to win 6-7 7-5 7-5 and book her well deserved place in the Round of 64. The former world number 32 – who is now 27 years-old – was able to outlast the 171st ranked 26-year-old local hope in a match unlikely to be forgotten by those in attendance.

Sorribes Tormo served at an efficiency of 78 per cent, while winning 53 and 58 per cent of her first and second serves. Gao won a higher first serve percentage (57 per cent) but only went at a 62 per cent clip. The Spaniard broke eight times from 14 chances, while Gao still broke six times from a whopping 18 chances in the match.

A ridiculous 265 points were played throughout the marathon match, with Sorribes Tormo eventually winning 136 of them to Gao’s 129 to book her spot in the second round. The Spanish qualifier will now take on American 18th seed Madison Keys who spent four hours and 15 minutes less on court after a first round bye.

Perhaps the most incredible element about the win was it surpassed German Laura Siegemund‘s four-hour and nine-minute effort just a week ago in Hua Hin where she defeated another Chinese player in Xiyu Wang.

The other Spanish player in action on day two was Cristina Bucsa who won in 93 minutes over 286th ranked wildcard Xinxin Yao, 6-3 6-2. It was equally a good day for the Romanians with both Irina-Camelia Begu and Jaqueline Cristian making it through to the second round, while Danish young gun Clara Tauson came from behind to defeat Brit Harriet Dart.

Unfortunately for Australia it was not as promising with all three representatives bowing out at the first stage of asking. Arina Rodionova went down to Italian Elisabetta Cocciaretto in three sets, while Ajla Tomljanovic and Kimberly Birrell lost to Camila Osorio and Kamilla Rakhimova respectively.