Sania in quarters of doubles, mixed doubles; Paes beats Bhupathi

Melbourne, Jan 20 (IANS) Sania Mirza enjoyed a successful outing at the Australian Open here Monday, reaching the quarterfinals in the women’s doubles and mixed doubles. Two more Indians – Leander Paes and Rohan Bopanna – made the mixed doubles quarters with their respective partners.

Sania and Cara Black of Zimbabwe beat the Canada-Russian pair of Eugenie Bouchard and Vera Dushevina 6-4, 6-3 in a third round match on Court 2.

The sixth seeds play top seeds Sara Errani and Roberta Vinci of Italy in the last eight match Tuesday.

The Indian partnering Romania’s Horia Tecau later defeated the Australian-English duo of Anastasia Rodionova and Colin Fleming 6-2, 6-2 in the mixed doubles second round. The sixth seeds face either the pair of Julia Goerges-Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi or Andrea Hlavackova-Max Mirnyi in the quarterfinals.

Leander Paes alongside Slovakian Daniela Hantuchova got the better of eighth seeds Mahesh Bhupathi and Russian Elena Vesnina 6-0, 2-6, 10-6. The unseeded pair next take on Daniel Nestor of Canada and Kristina Mladenovic of France.

Second seeds Rohan Bopanna and Katarina Srebotnik of Slovakia got past Australia’s Ashleigh Barty and John Peers 7-6 (5), 7-5. They await seventh seeds Kveta Peschke and Marcin Matkowski in the quarters.