LONDON: Indians had a reasonably good day in the Wimbledon doubles' competition with Leander Paes and Sania Mirza winning their respective matches but it was curtains for Mahesh Bhupathi, who was sent packing in the first round itself here.
Paes, partnering Czech Lukas Dlouhy, advanced to the third round with a 6-3 7-6 (3) 6-3 win over the combination of American Eric Butorac and Australian Ashley Fisher last night.
The ninth seeds will take on winners of the match between American-Slovak pair of Travis Parrott and Filip Polasek and South African-Polish duo of Rik de Voest and Lukasz Kubot.
Sania, who has crashed out of the singles event, made a winning start in women's doubles and partnering American Bethanie Mattek beat locals Elena Batacha and Naomi Cavady 6-4 6-2 in the first round on Thursday.
However, Bhupathi and Knowles, seeded fourth, lost 5-7 2-6 6-7 (4), to the pair of Philipp Petzschner of Germany and Alexander Peya of Austria in their opening match.
Another Indian in the fray, Davis Cupper Rohan Bopanna, and his Pakistani partner Aisam-ul-haq Qureshi, lost their second round encounter 2-6 4-6 2-6 to Spanish pair of Marcel Granollers-Pujol and Santiago Ventura.
Meanwhile, Sania, who has paired with doubles ace Mahesh Bhupathi in mixed doubles, booked a second round berth in the competition after getting a bye in the first round. Sania and Bhupathi have been seeded 11th.
Paes and Australian partner Rennae Stubbs advanced to the mixed doubles' second round, thanks to a first round bye. They have been seeded 10th in the competition.
Interestingly, Bopanna also finds himself in the second round of the mixed doubles with Belarusian partner Tatiana Poutchek after getting a first round bye.
