Leander Paes and Adil Shamasdin enter doubles final of Leon Challenger

Leander Paes, named a reserve in India’s Davis Cup team for the Uzbekistan tie, is in line to win his first title of the season, albeit on the Challenger Tour, with Canadian partner Adil Shamasdin. [caption id=“attachment_2940568” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File picture of Leander Paes. AP[/caption] Paes and Shamasdin, seeded third, beat the giant-killing Australian pair of Luke Saville and John-Patrick Smith 6-7 (1), 6-4, 10-5 in the semifinals of the Leon Challenger tournament $75,000 hard court event. They will meet Luca Margaroli of Switzerland and Caro Zampieri of Brazil in the final. It will be first final for Paes this season. He had reached the semifinals of Dubai Championships and Delray Beach Open. The last title Paes won on the ATP World Tour was in 2015 when he triumphed at Auckland with South African Raven Klaasen. Paes’ last Grand Slam in the men’s doubles event came in 2013 with Radek Stepanek at the US Open while in the mixed doubles he is still a force, winning three titles with Martina Hingis in 2015 and the French Open last season. Paes was named a reserve along with Rohan Bopanna with new non-playing captain Mahesh Bhupathi picking four singles players in the playing squad. Bhupathi has said that he may pick either Paes or Bopanna, if required, as a double specialist in the tie, slated for April 7-9 in Bengaluru.