Paes-Stosur seeded 3rd, tough draw for Sania in mixed doubles

Melbourne, Jan 20 (UNI) Sania Mirza and her French teammate Fabrice Santoro were handed a tough draw that pits them against second seeds Mark Knowles of Bahama and Austrailan Rennae Stubbs in the opening round of the mixed doubles event at the Australian Open here.

Meanwhile, Leander Paes and local favourite Samantha Stosur have been seeded third in the event and the Indo-Ausrtalian pair kicks off their campaign at the Rod Laver Arena tomorrow with an opening round tie against unseeded Yves Allegro of Switzerland and Russian Elena Bovina.

Paes' estranged doubles partner Mahesh Bhupathi, who won the mixed doubles title last year with Swiss Miss Martina Hingis, teams up with Slovak beauty Daniela Hantuchova and they face Serbian pair of Nenad Zimonjic and Jelena Jankovic in the first round.

Bhupathi's partnership with Hantuchova had proved successful in 2005 with the pair winning the US Open.

UNI