The Indo-Russian pair of Mahesh Bhupathi and Nadia Petrova entered the mixed doubles second round at the Australian Open after defeating Anastasia Rodionova and Jean-Julien Roger here on Sunday.
The Bhupathi-Petrova pair eased past the Australian-Dutch pairing 6-4, 6-2 to join compatriots Leander Paes, Rohan Bopanna and Sania Mirza in the second round. In fact, the Indian trio made a winning start with different partners.
Bhupathi-Petrova will now play Slovakia's Katarina Srebotnik and Serbian Nenad Zimonjic. The duo converted half of their eight break point opportunities while their opponents broke once in seven attempts. Their 34 winners to Srebotnik-Zimonjic's 10 also made a big difference in the one-sided scoreline. Bhupathi-Petrova are drawn to play Paes and Russia's Elena Vesnina in the quarter-finals.
Sania and Bob Bryan meet American duo of Abigail Spears and Scott Lipsky for a place in the last eight while Bopanna and her partner from Chinese Taipei partner, Su-Wei Hsieh, face Daniela Hantuchova of Slovakia and Italy's Fabio Fognini.
