Leach-Ferreira romp into final

Rick Leach of the United States and Ellis Ferreira of South Africa will meet Petr Pala and Pavel Vizner of Czechoslovakia in the final of the Touchtel ATP World Doubles Challenge Cup.

In the semi-finals, at the Kingfisher McDowell KSLTA stadium, on Friday evening, Leach and Ferreira scored a 6-2, 6-4 victory over Mark Knowles of the Bahamas and Brian MacPhie of the United States, while the Czechs were as convincing winners over top seeds Donal Johnson and Jarred Palmer of the United States, at 6-4, 6-1.

It was a one-sided semi-final as Ferriera and Leach won in less than an hour against the Austrlian Open champions. The match was marred by some unpleasant incidents, with ATP referee Jerry Armstrong penalising Knowles.

The match was interrupted for some time after Knowles and MacPhie questioned a line call in the third game of the first set, with Knowles serving at 0-15. They repeatedly questioned umpire Nitin Kanamwar, and MacPhie hit the ball outside the stadium. Armstrong penalised the pair and left them trailing 1-2.

This unsavoury incident seemed to badly affect the duo and they were never able to raise their game thereafter. MacPhie served well but Ferriera and Leach, who has come back from retirement, looked too strong.

With score reading 2-4 against them, Knowles made crucial errors at the net in the seventh game and lost serve with a double-fault. Enjoying a 5-2 lead, Leach held serve to take the set in 25 minutes.

In the second set, Ferriera and Leach broke their opponents in the third game. The winners came close to wrapping the match early but Knowles succeeded in holding his serve in the seventh game. However, the formalities of winning the set were completed in 31 minutes.

Commenting the victory, Leach said: It will be really exciting. It is great playing tennis at this level for such long period. We concentrated on playing a consistent game and keeping the ball in play for as long as we could."

Ferriera said: "We felt despondent on the first day when we lost our first match, but the last two days (when they won both the matches) were better; we are excited about tomorrow's match. We will have a shot at it."

MacPhie complained that the "line calls were not consistent". He said: "This was our common refrain. However, we should give full credit to Leach and Ferriera as they played pretty well."

In the other semi-final, Petr Pala and Pavel Vizner, who had shocked the Indian pair of Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi on Thursday, continued with their fine form to easily dispose of Johnson and Palmer.

Johnson was broken in the third game of the first set, the only service break in the set.

In the second set, Johnson was broken in the very first game and he went into a shell to be broken in the third and seventh games as well.

"I enjoyed the match today. I think we really played well. We were a little confident after beating Mahesh and Leander in their backyard yesterday," said Pala. "The final will be difficult. I would say we have a 50-50 chance." he added.

Earlier reports:
Day 3: Paes/Bhupathi crash out
Day 2: Paes/Bhupathi score second successive victory
Day 1: Paes-Bhupathi kick off campaign in style