Bhupathi-Knowles in men`s doubles semis; Paes-Black out

Melbourne, Jan 27 (PTI) On a sweet-sour day for India,
Mahesh Bhupathi and Mark Knowles cruised into the semifinals
of men's doubles but the top-seeded mixed doubles pair of
Leander Paes and Cara Black were shocked in the second round
of the Australian Open here Tuesday.

The third-seeded Indo-Bahamian duo of Bhupathi and
Knowles overcame a second set deficit to beat the Spanish pair
of Feliciano Lopez and Fernando Verdasco 6-1, 2-6, 6-4 in one
hour and 28 minutes.

The quarterfinal clash saw Bhupathi and Knowles break the
Spanish pair thrice while dropping their own serve twice.

The winners played a controlled game, committing just
four unforced errors to 11 of their opponents. They next play
Lukasz Kubot of Poland and Oliver Marach of Austria.

However, Paes and Black, the reigning US Open champions,
were outplayed 1-6, 5-7 by the unseeded Swiss-South African
combine in just 64 minutes.

The winners broke Paes and Black twice each in both the
sets while the Indo-Zimbabwean pair could break their rivals
only once in the second set.

Among the juniors, top seed Yuki Bhambri continued his
impressive showing as he reached the pre-quarterfinals of the
singles and quarterfinals of the doubles with Chinese Taipei's
Liang-Chi Huang.

In the singles second round, Yuki beat local Stephen Hoh
7-6 (1), 6-0 while in the doubles he and Liang, top-seeded
pair, beat Italian Marco Bortolotti and Vladzimir Kruk of
Belarus 6-3, 6-4.

However, it was curtains for Kaza Vinayak Sharma, who
lost his singles second round match 1-6 1-6 to Justin Eleveld
of The Netherlands.

In girls' doubles, Kyra Shroff and her Canadian partner
Eugenie Bouchard lost 4-6, 1-6 to the sixth seeded pair of
American Christina McHale and Ajla Tomljanovic of Croatia in
the second round. PTI