Leander Paes and his Czech Partner Lukas Dlouhy crashed out of the French Open men's doubles competition.
PARIS: Leander Paes and his Czech Partner Lukas Dlouhy on Sunday crashed out of the French Open men's doubles competition after losing 4-6 4-6 at the hands of Pablo Cuevas of Uruguay and Luis Horna of Peru in the pre-quarterfinals here.
Nothing went right for the ninth seeded Indo-Czech duo and they were rusty throughout the 64-minute contest. They were second best in serve and could not hold on their own in the rallies. On top of that, they had double faults at crucial points.
Their unseeded opponents got as many as 11 break points in the match, though converted only three of them. But for saving eight break points by Paes and Dlouhy, the match would have been finished even quicker and scoreline much worse for the Indo-Czech pair.
With the exit of Paes, who won doubles titles here in 1999 and 2001 partnering with Mahesh Bhupathi on both occasions, no Indian survived in the men's doubles.
Bhupathi, who paired up with Bahamas' Mark Knowles, and Rohan Bopanna, who teamed up with Pakistani Aisam Qureshi, had earlier lost in their opening rounds.
In the mixed doubles, Bhupathi and Jie Zheng of China defeated Paes and Nadia Petrova of Russia 7-5, 6-4 in a 72-minute absorbing first round contest.
The Indo-Chinese duo will now meet sixth seeded pair of Cara Black (Zimbabwe) and Paul Hanley (Australia) who got the better of Elena Likhovtseva and Daniel Nestor 6-4, 3-6, 10-7.
Yuki Bambri also made an early exit in the boy's singles after suffering a 2-6, 1-6 defeat against Guillaume Rufin of France in the opening round.
The Delhi lad was outplayed by his opponent in all departments of the game in the 62-minute contest.
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