Paes-Damm advances, Bhupathi-Gimelstob crashes out in Cincinnati

Cincinnati, Aug 17 (UNI) Leander Paes and Martin Damm stormed into the quarter-finals of the Cincinnati Open with a 6-3, 6-2 win over Lukas Dlouhy and Pavel Vizner but Mahesh Bhupathi and his American partner Justin Gimelstob crashed out following a 6-7(1), 7-5, 4-10 loss to Jonathan Erlich and Andy Ram in the second round of the 2.45 million dollar ATP event.

Paes and Damm had little trouble getting past their unseeded Czech rivals to continue their good run this year, which saw them win the Ordina Open title at Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands and reach the finals of the Australian Open.

The seventh seeds hardly put a foot wrong and never allowed any opening to their unheralded rivals as they set up a quarter-final clash with Mark Knowles of Bahamas and Daniel Nestor of Canada.

The Indo-Czech pair has a 21-13 season record and is looking for their first ATP Masters Series shield.

Paes took home the Cincinnati crown in 2001 with now estranged partner Bhupathi.

However, Bhupathi and his first-time partner Gimelstob crashed out this year after a hard fought match against sixth seeds Erlich and Ram.

The unseeded Indo-American pair gave a tough fight to the Argentine-Israeli pair but eventually ran out of steam to bow out of the event.

Bhupathi and Gimelstob matched their opponents shot for shot from the very first set but failed to land the final blow on most occasions and lost the opener in the tie-breaker.

Having learnt from their mistakes in the first set, the Indo-American pair raised its game in the next set and managed to equalise against the sixth seeds.

However, the gruelling battle in the final set took its toll on the first-time pair and Bhupathi and Gimelstob surrendered the match in the tie-breaker to crash out of the tournament.

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