Bhupathi-Sugiyama in second round

Shailesh Soni

The seventh seed pair of Mahesh Bhupathi and Ai Sugiyama began their quest for the Australian Open mixed doubles title on a winning note.

They defeated David Rikl (CZE) and Karina Habsudova (SVK) 7-5, 7-6(11-9) in a first round match on Friday.

The match started off with Rikl/Habsudova serving. Bhupathi/Sugiyama converted their first break chance at advantage out, to go up in the third game. That advantage didn't last, as Rikl/Habsudova broke right back in the next game to make it 2-2.

Bhupathi/Sugiyama had a break chance in the next game as well, but couldn't convert it. However, they broke in game 11 to pick the set at 7-5.

Bhupathi/Sugiyama had five break chances, virtually one in each game, but they could convert only two. The first set took 42 minutes.

The second set was a see-saw affair with fast exchanges of breaks, but in the end it it went to a long tiebreaker.

Bhupathi/Sugiyama had two break chances in game 1, which they could not convert. They got the vital service break in game 3, only to drop serve in game 6 and lose the edge.

Bhupathi/Sugiyama then broke Rikl/Habsudova in the next game, but lost serve again immediately as the scoreline read 4-4. Then the games went with serve and into the tie-breaker.

In the tie-breaker, Bhupathi/Sugiyama went up a minibreak at 5-4 with Rikl doublefaulting, but Mahesh did the same and it was back on serve. Bhupathi/Sugiyama had two match points at 6-5 and 8-7, which they could not convert. At 9-9, Bhupathi served an ace to go up 10-9. Habsudova double faulted to end the match at 6-7(9-11).

The match took an hour and 45 minutes, and was very closely fought.

Bhupathi/Sugiyama will now face the Australian pair of Peter Tramacchi/Rachel McQuillan in the second round.

Leander Paes and Lisa Raymond will face the Australian pair of Todd Perry and Bryanne Stewart on Saturday in their first round match.