New York: Leander Paes and Radek Stepanek have made their way to the semi-finals of the men’s doubles of US Open on Tuesday after they knocked out the fifth seed Pakistani-Dutchman duo of Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi and Jean-Julien Rojer. Paes-Stepanek will take on American brothers Mike and Bob Bryan, who thrashed British pair of Colin Fleming and Jonathan Marray 7-6 (7), 6-4 in their quarterfinal match.
The fourth seeded pair of Paes-Stepanek battled it out for two and a half hour against the pair of Qureshi-Rojer before winning the duel by 6-1, 6-7 (3), 6-4.
Indo-Czech pair had a great start when they clinched the opening set in just 31 minutes. They broke their rivals twice in this set but the second set saw some great fightback from Qureshi-Rojer. The next couple of sets consumed almost couple of hours to decide the winner of the match.
It got hard for both the pairs to take a break point in the second set. Paes-Stepanek couldn’t capitalise on the three double faults that were committed by Qureshi and Rojer. The Pak-Dutch duo always managed to get an equalizer and finally snatch the second set in a tie-breaker.
The third set was very much on the lines of second, but this time the Indo-Czech duo didn’t fail to convert that valuable break point which was enough to seal the match in their favour.
Murray sets up clash with Wawrinka
Meanwhile, in the men’s singles match of Round 4, defending champion Andy Murray reached the US Open quarter-finals for a third time in a row after overpowering Uzbekistan's Denis Istomin by 6-7 (5/7), 6-1, 6-4, 6-4 win over on Tuesday.
It was the second instance when Murray dropped a set in the tournament and will now take on Stanislas Wawrinka, the ninth-seeded Swiss, who put out Czech fifth seed Tomas Berdych.
