India’s challenge in the ATP Paris Masters tennis tournament came to an end after Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi, along with their respective partners, exited the doubles event following surprise defeats in the second round in Paris. The third seeded pair of Bhupathi and Bahamian Mark Knowles went down 4-6 7-6 (6) 7-10 to the unseeded Swede-Australian duo of Simon Aspelin and Paul Hanley.

 

Paes and his Czech partner Lukas Dlouhy, who were seeded fourth, also lost to unseeded players, going down 7-6 (5) 4-6 5-10 to the Australian-American pair of Jordan Kerr and Travis Parrott in the Euro 2,750,000 tournament. Paes and Dlouhy were the first to play and had to struggle hard in the opening set itself, saving five break points before winning in the tie-breaker.

 

But they were in for harder times in the second set and lost their serve once. Bhupathi and Knowles also failed to convert the only break point they got as Kerr and Parrott made it 1-1 before winning in the super tie-breaker.

 

Later, Bhupathi and Knowles came from behind from a set down but the endeavour could not help them win the match as Aspelin and Hanley held on in the super tie-breaker to advance into the quarterfinals.