Bhupathi-Stepnak books semifinal berth at Monte Carlo

Monte Carlo, Apr 22 (UNI) Mahesh Bhupathi and his Czech partner Radek Stepnak sailed in to the semifinals of the Master Series with a facile 6-4, 7-5 victory over the Swiss pair of Roger Federer and Yves Allegro here.

The Indo-Czech pair took little over an hour to seal the match in straight sets against the singles top seed Federer and his compatriot Allegro.

Bhupathi and Stepnak will now take on the tournament top seeds Jonas Bjorkman of Sweden and Max Mirnyi of Belarus, who beat the Polish pair of Mariusz Fyrstenberg and Marcin Matkowski 6-3, 6-4 in the other semifinal played yesterday.

Bhupathi-Stepnak started well, holding on to their serve in the first set and also converted one break point of the three they got.

In contrast, the world number one and his partner had a wayward start and committed three double faults. They were broken once by the Indo-Czech pair and failed to convert the only break point they earned, losing the set 6-4.

The next set saw Federer and Allegro making a comeback but Bhupathi and Stepnak saw off the minor resistence put up by them and built on the momentum gained in the first set, breaking their opponents twice on their way to booking a semifinal berth.

Bhupathi-Stepnak won the second set 7-5 to ensure themselves a spot among the last four.

Meanwhile, Roger Federer's doubles campaign might have ended on a disappointing note, after the loss against Bhupathi-Stepnak, but the World number one was on a roll in the singles competition and sailed past Spaniard David Ferrer with a 6-1, 6-3 victory to enter the semifinals. He will now take on Chilean Fernando Gonzalez, who defeated Croatian Ivan Ljubicic 7-5, 6-1 in the other quarterfinal.

Defending champion Rafael Nadal of Spain will go head-to-head with Argentine Gaston Gaudio for a spot in the final after picking up a quick 6-2, 6-1 victory over another Argentine Guillermo Coria.

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