Henri Kontinen and John Peers booked their spot in the semi-finals of the BNP Paribas Masters on Friday as they ousted third seeds Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan 6-4, 6-2 in 51 minutes.
Kontinen and Peers qualified for the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals earlier in the week and will look to reach their second ATP World Tour Masters 1000 final of the season in Paris. The Finnish/Australian duo have been in a rich vein of form in the latter stages of the season, finishing runners-up at the Shanghai Rolex Masters last month (l. to Isner/Sock).
“Today was another strong performance from us,” Peers said. “We took our chances early in both sets and kept that going. It’s really good we can now put quality matches together in a row. We are excited to get out there again tomorrow and see what we can do.”
Kontinen and Peers go on to face sixth seeds Marcelo Melo and Vasek Pospisil, who rallied from a set down to edge Grigor Dimitrov and Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi 3-6, 6-3, 10-8 in 75 minutes. Melo, who will compete at The O2 with Ivan Dodig, is the defending champion in Paris. He and Dodig defeated Pospisil and Jack Sock in the final at the AccorHotels Arena last year.
"It was a tough match today," said Pospisil. "Our opponents were playing better than us at the start of the match, but we hung in there and tried to stay positive even though we weren't feeling great on the court.
"We were able to turn it around and pick up our level as the match went on. We came up with some great shots when we needed it at the end."
Top seeds Pierre-Hugues Herbert and Nicolas Mahut put some more distance between themselves and Jamie Murray and Bruno Soares in the battle for year-end World No. 1 as they reached the semi-finals. The French duo prevailed against fifth seeds Feliciano Lopez and Marc Lopez 6-3, 6-7(5), 10-6 in one hour and 34 minutes.
Herbert and Mahut, the Wimbledon champions, opened up a 335-point lead over Murray and Soares in the year-to-date standings, with the British/Brazilian duo having fallen in the second round this week to Dimitrov and Qureshi. Herbert and Mahut are chasing their sixth tour-level title of the season and fourth ATP World Tour Masters 1000 crown, having lifted the trophies in Monte-Carlo, Miami and Indian Wells.
The Frenchman will face eighth seeds Rohan Bopanna and Daniel Nestor in the semi-finals. Bopanna/Nestor advanced past Americans Nicholas Monroe and Jack Sock 6-2, 3-6, 10-5 in 60 minutes.