Paes-Black advance to French Open mixed doubles quarters

Paris: Leander Paes and his partner Cara Black advanced to the quarterfinals of the French Open mixed doubles event after a hard-fought victory in super tie-breaker over Su-Wei Hsieh and Bruno Soares here on Monday.

The second seeded Indo-Zimbabwe pair beat the unseeded Chinese Taipei-Brazilian duo of Hsieh and Soares 7-5 2-6 1-0 (10/8) in a second round match which lasted 111 minutes and spread over two days. Rain delay and bad light had forced the match to stop last night after Paes and Black were leading 7-5 0-2. In the quarterfinals, Paes and Black will take on another unseeded duo of Yaroslava Shvedova of Kazakhstan and Julian Knowle of Austria.Partnering with Lucas Dlouhy of Czech Republic, Paes, the lone Indian remaining in the fray in the clay court Grand Slam, has also reached the quarterfinals in men’s doubles. Paes and Dlouhy, the defending champions, will meet Polish pair of Mariusz Fyrstenberg and Marcin Matkowski in the last eight stage. PTI