LONDON, CMC - Bahamian tennis star Mark Knowles and his Mixed Doubles partner, American star Venus Williams struggled before capturing their opening match at the Wimbledon Championship on Monday.

The eighth-seeded pair overcame the loss of the first set to turn back the challenge of Australia's Todd Perry and Belgium's Els Callens, 6-7, 6-4, 6-4 and advance to the next round.

The pair looked on their way out of the tournament when they found themselves down 1-5 in the opening set but they fought back to 4-5 before
losing the set. Knowles and Williams lifted their game in the second set and easily won at 6-4 and in the third set, the experienced Bahamian doubles player stamped his authority on the match. Through his efforts, the duo managed to break Perry and Callens and go 4-2 up but Williams had her serve broken and the scores were reduced to a 4-4 deadlock.

However, Williams displayed her trademark power to break back and Knowles served out the game to ensure a trip to the next round. It was one of two victories on the day for Knowles who also teamed up with new partner Michael Llodra of France to outlast Ivo Karlovic of Croatia and Rogier Wassen of the Netherlands in five grueling sets, 4-6, 6-3, 2-6, 6-1, 7-5 in a third round Men's Doubles encounter.

Knowles and Llodra will now meet Stephen Huss of Australia and Wesley Moodie of South Africa in the next round.