Paes, Bhupathi advance

Indian aces Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi entered the second round of the doubles competition at the French Open on Thursday.

Fifth seeds Paes and David Rikl of the Czech Republic beat David Adams of South Africa and Justin Gimelstob of the United States 6-3, 6-2 while second seeds Bhupathi and Max Miryni of Belarus got the better of Thomas Shimada of Japan and Myles Wakefield of South Africa 7-5, 6-3.

Paes and Rikl will meet the US pair of Rick Leach and Brian MacPhie, who beat Aisam Qureshi of Pakistan and Daniel Vacek of the Czech republic 6-3, 6-3.

Bhupathi and Miryni take on Thierry Ascione and Julien Varlet of France. The French pair accounted for Slovakia's Karol Beck and Karol Kucera 6-2, 4-6, 6-4.

In the mixed doubles draw, Paes and Bhupathi are drawn to face each other in the quarter-finals if the seeds live up to their billing.

Paes and partner Martina Navratilova have been seeded seventh and are drawn to play Patricia Wartusch of Austria and Joshua Eagle of Australia.

Bhupathi will pair with his former partner Elena Likhovtseva. They have been seeded No. 3 and will play Tatiana Golovin of France and Mansour Bahrami of Iran. Bahrami is the oldest tennis player on view while Tatiana is one of the youngest.