NEW DELHI: Leander Paes and Martin Damm sneaked through to the semifinals after scoring a hard-fought victory in the last group match over Jonathan Erlich and Andy Ram of Israel at the ATP Tennis Masters Cup in Shanghai, China, on Thursday.
Paes and Damm clinched the Red Group tie 6-4 7-6 (6) but still had to thank Australian Paul Hanley and Kevin Ullyett of Zimbabwe for their last-four berth.
Hanley and Ullyett defeated the top seeded Bryan brothers, Bob and Mike, of America 3-6, 7-6 (7-4), 6-4 in the other group match to maintain an all-win record.
That left the three teams of Paes-Damm, Bob-Mike and Elrich-Ram with one win from three matches each.
The Indo-Czech pair, this year's US Open champions, advanced to the knock-out stage by virtue of a better set percentage.
The pairings will be decided after the Blue Group matches are completed on Friday.
"We've won three in a row, so we're on top of the world," Ullyett said after upsetting the Bryan brothers.
"I think this is out of respect to the Bryans, to have them out of the tournament, it's actually good for everyone. They're hard to beat. I'm sure the other guys are quite happy about that because they're the best team in the world, you know. So to not have to play them again is actually quite nice. So we're really trying to knock them out of the tournament, yeah," he said.
