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Paes's winning streak ends

Shailesh Soni

It was another bad day for seeded players in the Gold Flake Open, as the top seeded doubles pair of Leander Paes and Byron Black bowed out in the second round itself on Wednesday.

Julien Boutter and Cristophe Rochus  Photo Courtsey: www.chennaionline.com

Paes had won the title thrice in a row partnering Mahesh Bhupathi. However, the latest alliance with Black was not as fruitful as the top seeds lost to wildcard entrants Christophe Rochus and Julien Boutter 3-6, 4-6.

In fact, Rochus and Boutter had looked good in the first round itself when they whipped the Kirtanes.

The second round exit thus ended Paes's 13-match doubles winning streak in the Gold Flake Open. The Indian ace had not lost a doubles match in India in the last five years - including the Challengers, Davis Cup and other events - in a winning streak of over 25 matches.

Indeed, the loss was a big disappointment for the goodly crowd. Nothing seemed to go the way of the former and current World doubles number 1. And it was Black who was the main problem. In the first set, he lost his serve in the eighth game at 0-40. Thereafter, they could not comeback and break their opponents' serve.

In the second set, again Black lost his serve in the third game. The top seeds did try to break their opponents' serve in the fourth game but could not capitalise on the chances they got.

Paes looked quite disappointed and kept encouraging his partner right through but that was not enough to strike up a winning combination.

Interestingly, Boutter had considerable support from young members of the audience.

"Things didn't go very well for us," Paes said later, pointing out that Boutter's huge serves were a big factor for the shock defeat.

Boutter and Rochus, though playing together for the first time, showed better spirit and initiative and ran down practically every ball. Totally off rhythm, Paes lost his shirt and vented his anger at the spectators, who retorted: "Cool it, Leander."

In the other results in doubles, the Indian pair of M Ghouse and V Uppal lost to T Ketola and O Ogorodov, 6-2, 7-5; S Panja and S Prahlad defeated A Ram and Syed Fazaluddin 6-4, 6-4.