Mirza-Niculescu advance to Connecticut Open semis; Paes-Begemann upset top seeds at Winston-Salem Open

After splitting up with Martina Hingis two weeks back, Sania Mirza became the lone holder of the World No.1 spot in women’s doubles on Sunday after winning the Cincinnati Open along with her partner Barbora Strycova. Sania and Strycova had defeated Hingis and Coco Vandeweghe 7-5, 6-4 to win the title.

Continuing her preparations for the upcoming US Open, Sania joined hands with Monica Niculescu of Romania for the Connecticut Open tennis tournament in New Haven, USA. The second seeds started the tournament with an easy 6-0, 6-3 win over the American wildcard team of Louisa Chirico and Alison Riske. Yesterday, they took on Darija Jurak of Croatia and Anastasia Rodionova of Australia in the quarters, and defeated them 6-1, 6-4 to advance to the semis.

The Indo-Romanian pair converted all the four break points and outplayed Darija Jurak and Anastasia Rodionova by dominating the first serve. Sania and Niculescu won 76% of the first service, while their opponents managed only 57%. The second seeds will now face Andreja Klepač and Katarina Srebotnik for a place in the final.

In Winston-Salem Open, India’s Leander Paes and his German partner Andre Begemann also reached the last four after defeating Łukasz Kubot and Nenad Zimonjić 6-4, 6-4. The Indo-German pair will now face third seeds Robert Lindstedt and Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi in the semis.

In US Open qualifiers, Saketh Myneni beat USA's Mitchell Krueger 7-6 (6), 6-4 in a tight match to keep his hope of qualifying for the main round of the tournament. Saketh will now face 21-year-old Pedja Krstin of Serbia in his third and final round of the qualifiers.