Paes/Bhupathi win Japan Open

India's Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi won the men's doubles event in the Japan Open tennis tournament on Sunday when they defeated the unseeded pair of Michael Hill of Australia and Jeff Tarango of America 6-4, 6-7, 6-3.

This is the first title for the Indians, who finished last year as the world's top doubles team, but have been struggling to get back their winning streak after breaking up soon after and then resuming playing together later this year.

The Indians started off well in the first set and got the vital service break in the ninth game to take the set 6-4.

In the second set the Indians were broken in the sixth game, but broke back in the ninth game to force the set to the tiebreaker. In the tie-breaker Hill and Tarango got the better of the Indians and took the set at 7-6.

With the scores levelled, the Indians started off the third set with a bang, getting an early break in the second game to lead 3-0. But then they dropped serve again in the fifth game to fall back on serve.

The Indians, however, didn't gave up as they went after a break in the ninth game to go up 5-3 and then served for the match.

The match took 135 minutes and seemed not an easy affair by any means.

Paes and Bhupathi won five matches in a row at the Japan Open, scalping the eighth, second and fifth seeds on their way to the final. The title gave them $44,500 to share and 250 entry points, which will put them back in the top 50.

It was the sixteenth title for the Indians from 21 ATP final appearances. The five finals they lost are the Singapore Open in 1998 to Australians Mark Woodforde and Todd Woodbridge, the Australian Open in 1999 to Patrick Rafter of Australia and Jonas Bjorkman of Sweden, the 1999 US Open to Sebastien Lareau and Richard O'Brien of Canada, the World Doubles Championship at Hartford 1997 to Rick Leach and Jonathan Stark of the US, and the 1999 edition of the Hartford tournament to Elis Ferreira and Rick Leach.