Paes & Chardy enter Delray Beach semis

Veteran Indian star Leander Paes and French partner Jeremy Chardy fought off a strong challenge from Marcel Granollers and Sam Groth in the quarter-finals of the $514,065 Delray Beach Open being held at the Delray Beach Tennis Center here.

The Indo-French combination squandered an early lead before staging a superb comeback to carve out a 6-3, 4-6, 10-6 win and enter the semi-finals on Thursday.

Paes and Chardy will now meet the top seeded US pair of Bob and Mike Bryan in the last four stage. Mike and Bob moved closer to claiming their third consecutive doubles title here after being handed a walkover in the quarter-finals when a leg injury to Mikhail Kukushkin meant he and Illya Marchenko could not take the court.

The Austrian-French pairing of Oliver Marach and Fabrice Martin also entered the semi-finals after defeating the American duo of Denis Kudla and Donald Young 6-4. The Czech-Belarussian team of Treat Huey and Max Mirnyi complete the semi-final line-up with a comfortable 6-4, 6-4 win over Australians Chris Guccione and Bernard Tomic. Huey and Mirnyi will clash with Marach and Martin for a place in the final.