India’s Sania Mirza and her Romanian partner Horia Tecau stormed into the semifinals of the mixed doubles event at the Australian Open with straight sets victory over Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi and Julia Georges, in Melbourne on Thursday.
Sixth seed Sania and Tecau hardly broke a sweat to prevail over the unseeded Aisam-Julia combination 6-3 6-4 in their quarterfinal clash that lasted just 63 minutes.
The Indo-Romanian duo will play Australian pair of Jarmila Gajdosova and Matthew Ebden in the semifinals.
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The unseeded Australian pair stunned second seeds Katarina Srebotnik of Sloivakia and India’s Rohan Bopanna 7-5 6-3 in another quarterfinal on Wednesday.
Sania and Tecau got three opportunities to break their opponents in the opening set, out of which they converted one, which was enough for the Indo-Romanian pair to pocket the set in 28 minutes.
In the next set, Sania and Tecau broke their opponents in the ninth game to serve out the set in 35 minutes and book a place in the last four stage.
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Paes-Hantuchova crash out
In another mixed doubles quarterfinals, Leander Paes and his Slovakian partner Daniela Hantuchova lost 3—6, 3—6 to Kristina Mladenovic from France and Canada’s Daniel Nestor.