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Bhupathi-Kafelnikov seeded tops at Stuttgart

India's top doubles player, Mahesh Bhupathi, will be teaming up with Yevgeny Kafelnikov of Russia in the $915,000 Mercedes Cup clay court tournament starting on Monday in Stuttgart, Germany.

Seeded first, the pair have a bye in the first round and will play the winners of the first round match between the Argentinian pair of L. Arnold and L. Lobo versus the Swedish pair of Magnus Gustafsson and Magnus Larsson in the round 2.

Mahesh and Kafelnikov are in the upper top half of the draw. Other seeded pairs in their half are eighth seeds of T. Kempers (NED) and A. Kitinov (MKD), fourth seeds D. Orsanic (ARG) and C. Suk (CZE) and sixth seeds F. Wibier (NED) and D. Adams (RSA). The number two seeds are Americans D. Johnson and F. Montana, who are in the other half of the draw.

A win in first round match will fetch 15 ATP points and $2,000. Round 2 will get 29 ATP points and $4,900. Quaterfinals will get 58 ATP points and $9,100. Semifinals are worth 115 ATP points and $17,280. Getting into the finals will be worth 198 ATP points and $32,890. And the winners of the title will get 280 ATP points and $62,640.

Mahesh decided to skip the Tampere Challenger last week because he was nursing the leg injury he had sustained during Wimbledon. He decided to play at Stuttgart to have some serious match practice ahead of the US Open where he will be pairing with Paes in the doubles and will be trying to defend the ATP points the two won last year.

Interestingly, in 1997, it was Kafelnikov pairing with Daniel Vacek who defeated the Paes-Bhupathi combine at the U S Open.