From correspondents in Emirates, United Arab Emirates, 09:32 PM IST

Wild card Rohan Bopanna and Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi defeated Igor Andreev of Russia and Paul-Henri Mathieu of France in straight sets to advance to the quarterfinal of Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships Wednesday.

The Indo-Pak duo, playing their third career ATP tournament, notched up a 7-5 6-4 win against Andreev and Mathieu in the first round.

Bopanna and Qureshi will next meet Daniel Nestor of Canada and Nenad Zimonjic of Serbia.

Leander Paes and Paul Hanley of Australia bowed out after losing to second seed Simon Aspelin of Sweden and Julian Knowle of Austria 1-6, 3-6.

Aspelin and Knowle will meet the French duo of Richard Gasquet and Fabrice Santoro in the quarterfinals.

Fourth seed Mahesh Bhuapthi and Mark Knowles will take on Austria's Jordan Kerr and Rogier Wassen of Netherlands in the first round later Wednesday.

(Staff Writer, © IANS)