Paes wins battle of Indians, beats Bhupathi-Sania

London:

Leander Paes emerged victorious in a contest involving three Indians as he and his partner Cara Black defeated Mahesh Bhupathi and Sania Mirza to advance to the mixed doubles quarterfinals of Wimbledon Championships here.

Top seeded Paes and Zimbabwean Black won 6-2, 6-7 (2), 6-3 in the two-hour-and-seven-minute third-round contest, which was the first between the two pairs, last night.

Paes and Black, who won the US Open mixed doubles title this year, were clearly the better pair in a rare match and also took advantage of the unforced errors committed by their opponents.

Thirteenth seeds Bhupathi and Sania committed nine double faults as compared to just one by their opponents though the all-Indian pair sent down more number of aces (6 to 3).

Paes and Black got as many as eight break points in the first set out of which they converted two to win it in 35 minutes.

Bhupathi and Sania though were not ready to give up without a fight and they did it in good measure as Paes and Black committed unforced errors under pressure to lose the 55-minute second set which was stretched to the tie-break.

But the second set fightback didn't last long and Bhupathi and Sania were again done in by unforced errors and double faults, making it easy for Paes and Black to pocket the decider in 37 minutes.

In the quarterfinals, Paes and Black will face the winners of the match between Andre Sa (Brazil)/Ai Sugiyama (Japan) and Robert Lindstedt (Sweden)/Rennae Stubbs (Australia).