Bhupathi-Mirnyi in third round

Indian tennis ace Mahesh Bhupathi and Max Mirnyi of Belarus moved into the third round of the men's doubles competition at Wimbledon on Friday.

Seeded third in the tournament, Bhupathi and Mirnyi beat Tim Crichton of Australia and Mark Merklein of Bahamas 7-6(7-4), 6-4, 6-3 in a second round match.

It was another easy outing for the pair as they wrapped up the match in around 90 minutes.

The first set went with serve till 5-5, when Bhupathi/Mirnyi had two break-points, but were unable to convert them and the set went into the tie-breaker, which they won at 7-4.

In the second set, the duo wasted a couple of break chances. They again had a chance in the 10th game with triple set point, which they converted at the first chance itself.

In the third set, the duo were in the trouble in the first game, but they managed to save the game. They got the important service break in the sixth game and finished off the match to reach the final 16.

They play the 14th seeds Julien Boutter of France and Sjeng Schalken of the Netherlands in the third round.

In the other second round matches, Aisam Qureshi of Pakistan and Amir Hadad of Israel continued their dream run with a 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 upset over the 11th seeds Ellis Ferreira of South Africa and Rick Leach of the United States.

But the biggest shock of the day came in the match between fourth seeds Wayne Black and Kevin Ullyett of Zimbabwe and the Australian pairing of Andrew Florent and David Macpherson.

In a tight and evenly-contested match, Florent and Macpherson beat the defending US Open champions 6-4, 7-5, 7-6 (7-4).

Second seeds, Mark Knowles and Daniel Nestor continued their progress towards their third Grand Slam final of the year with a convincing 6-3, 6-4, 3-6, 6-1 win over the Czech pairing of Tomas Cibulec and Leos Friedl.

Knowles and Nester won the doubles title at the Australian Open in January and reached the final at Roland Garros, only to lose to Paul Haarhuis and Yevgeny Kafelnikov.

Fifth seeds Jonas Bjorkman and Todd Woodbridge also came through a difficult match against Martin Garcia and Luis Lobo of Argentina, winning 6-1, 2-6, 7-6(7-5), 6-3.

In Friday's schedule, Leander Paes-Lisa Raymond face the British pair of Karsten Braasch and Barbara Rittner in a mixed doubles first round match followed by Bhupathi-Likhovtseva facing David Macpherson of Australia Katie Schlukebir of the US in the second round match.

The young Indian girl Sania Mirza will also be on the court in her first round singles match against 16th seed Tatiana Golovin of France.