India’s nightmare at the French Open continued with Leander Paes and his Austrian partner Alexander Peya being dumped out of the men’s doubles second round by Mikhail Elgin of Russia and Denis Istomin of Uzbekistan here Saturday.
The seventh-seeded Paes-Peya pair after a tight first set lost in an hour and 11 minutes 4-6, 1-6.
The Indo-Austrian pair were knocked out despite making zero double faults or unforced errors. They failed to take advantage of the four break points on offer, converting only one of the them. The unseeded Russian-Uzbek combine on the other hand converted five of the 10 break points to move on to the next round.
India’s hopes now rest in the mixed doubles where fifth-seeded Paes and Elena Vesnina and seventh-seeded Mahesh Bhupathi and Sania Mirza are still in the fray.
Sixth seeds Bhupathi and Rohan Bopanna lost in the doubles first round to French pair of Marc Gicquel and Edouard Roger-Vasselin Thursday while Sania and her American partner Bethanie Mattek-Sands crashed out of the women’s doubles Tuesday.
Bopanna, partnering Lisa Raymond, lost to the unseeded team of Natalie Grandin and Paul Hanley in the opening round.
