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Paes-Bhupathi start on winning note

The world number one pairing of Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi -- seeded number one here -- began their quest for the world doubles title on a winning note at the Phoenix ATP Tour World Doubles Championship being played at Hartford.

The Indians, placed in the Gold group, won their first round robin match against the 8th seeded team of Piet Norval of South Africa and Zimbabwe's Kevin Ullyett in straight sets 7-6(1) 6-3.

The Indians were playing their first carpet match together this year, and only the second match since the US Open final. The match went with the serves till the sixth game. The Indians got the vital break in game seven, but Mahesh gave the break back in game 10 and the set went into the tiebreaker.

From here, the Indians never looked back, winning 19 of 22 points including a break in game 2 of the second set after putting away the first set tiebreaker at 7-1. In a spurt, they had gone to 3-0 up in the second, and the rest of the match was a foregone conclusion.

Mahesh was in some trouble, facing two break attempts in game 9, but he held on.

The Indians may have been a bit rusty at first (11 of 29 first serve percentage in the first set). However, they still managed to stay ahead throughout, and brought up the first serves to 55% by the end. It would have been even better had they converted two break chances in game six of the second set.

The other teams in the Gold Group are No 3 seeds Ferreira/Leach and No 6 seeds Black/Stolle. The "Green Group" has No 2 seeds Woodies, No 4 seeds Lareau/O'Brien, No 5 seeds Adams/DeJager and No 7 seeds Haarhuis/Palmer.

In other matches, the fourth-seeded duo of Sebastien Lareau of Canada and Alex O'Brien of the United States beat fifth-seeded South Africans David Adams and John-Laffnie de Jager 6-2 7-6 (7-5) in a Green Group encounter.

The third-seeded team of South African Ellis Ferreira and American Rick Leach defeated sixth-seeded Wayne Black of Zimbabwe and Sandon Stolle of Australia 6-3, 6-2 in a Gold Group match.

Dutchman Paul Haarhuis began the defence of his doubles championship without the help of his long-time partner Jacco Eltingh. The difference was evident. Two-time champions and second seeds Todd Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde of Australia dumped the seventh-seeded pair of Haarhuis and American Jared Palmer 6-4 6-2 in a Green Group round-robin match.

Haarhuis helped Eltingh end his career in perfect fashion last season when they won this event, beating Mark Knowles and Daniel Nestor in the final. It was the last of 39 titles the two claimed together.

This season, Haarhuis has tried out various partners before settling on Palmer, with whom he reached five finals, including Wimbledon. Their only title this year came at the RCA championships in Indianapolis in August.

The ''Woodies'' are in the midst of their longest title drought as a team. They have not won a tournament since capturing the Sybase Open in San Jose and Kroger st. Jude in Memphis in February, but have reached five other finals.

Woodbridge and Woodforde won this event in 1992 and 1996 and reached the final in 1993 and 1994.

Round-robin action continues on Thursday with Bhupathi and Paes facing Ferreira and Leach, the ''Woodies'' meeting Lareau and O'Brien, Haarhuis and Palmer battling Adams and de Jager, and Black and Stolle playing Norval and Ullyett.

This event uses a round-robin format with eight teams divided into two groups. Each pairing plays the others in their group once, and the top two teams with the best record in each group advance to Saturday's semifinals. The standings in each group are determined by the number of matches won.

The points from Hartford wins are used only to determine year-end team rankings, as the points do not go into the 52 week individual ranking point list. There are some good prize money incentives to win, and pick up points at Hartford, as there are "courtside bonus" monies which depends on the year-end team ranking.

This is in addition to the prize money for each win at Hartford. The points are determined as follows -- 90 points each for each round robin win and 20,000 dollars prize money for the winning pair to share; 180 points for a semifinal win and 40,000 dollars money for the winner; and 270 points for the final win with 70,000 dollars for the winner. The maximum points any team can get is 720, and and an undefeated winner would take home 190,000 dollars of the 900,000-dollar total purse.