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Paes, Bhupati in final of World Doubles

Mahesh Bhupathi (23) and Leander Paes (24) are the youngest players in the eight-team field at the World Doubles Championships now on at Hartford, Connecticut.

Yet, they played with impressive maturity, to down sixth seeds Sebastien Lareau of Canada and American Alex O'Brien, 6-1, 2-6, 7-6 (7-5), in just over two hours.

The Lareau-O'Brien pairing had, in the previous round, defeated the world's top ranked pairing of Todd Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde, but here the Indian pair proved too good for them, fighting back from a deficit in the third set to take it into the tiebreaker and pull out all the stops with a great display of serve and volley tennis. And, in the process, to book a final berth in their very first entry into the prestigious season-ending tournament.

Fourth-seeded Americans Rick Leach and Jonathan Stark meanwhile surprised second seeds Jacco Eltingh and Paul Haarhuis of the Netherlands, 6-3, 6-4 to join the Indian pair in Sunday's final.