Leander Paes and his Canadian partner Dainel Nestor advanced to the second round of the men’s doubles at Wimbledon, beating the Serbian pair of Victor Troicki and Dusan Lajovic 6-3, 6-4, 7-5 after an hour and 42 minutes on Wednesday.
However, Purav Raja and his French partner Fabrice Martin failed to make it to the next round. They went down fighting 1-6, 4-6, 6-4, 6-7 (7-9) to the 2012 Wimbledon champions, Jonathan Marray and Frederik Nielson.
Paes dropped serve at love in the third game, but the Indo-Canadian combination, seeded 11th, broke back immediately and then again at love in the sixth game for a 4-2 lead before holding to take the first set.
After games went with serve, Paes-Nestor broke in the seventh game for a 4-3 lead. They then held to close out the second set 6-4.
However, the third set was close as games went with serve till Paes-Nestor effected the crucial break in the 11th game after saving two break-points in the previous game to close out the match.
Raja-Martin produced a gallant show.
After losing the first two sets they did well to win the third and then saved a match-point in the fourth set tie-break and had a set point but, sadly, could not make the most of it.
Image: Daniel Nestor
Photograph: Clive Brunskill/Getty Images
