Michael Venus, Neal Skupski knock out top seeds at Paris Masters

Michael Venus and Neal Skupski have knocked out the No 1 seeds at the Paris Masters to advance to the quarterfinals of the ATP 1000 tournament.

On Thursday in the French capital they defeated Marcel Granollers from Spain and Argentina’s Horacio Zeballos 6-4 7-6(6).

It was a match where Venus and Skupski held their nerves in the clutch moments, winning all nine break points they had against them, while they got the only break of serve in the entire match, in the opening set.

This result follows Venus and Skupski’s emphatic win in the first round at the Paris Masters, when they defeated the experienced duo of Jean-Julien Rojer and Joe Salisbury 6-1 6-0.

It has been a strong end to the season for Venus and Skupski, who only started playing together regularly at the beginning of the grass court season.

Last week they reached the final in Vienna, losing in a third set super tiebreaker against Alexander Erler and Lucas Miedler and they’ve continued that strong form into the Paris Masters.

However, as they started playing together midway through the season, they haven’t been able to pick up enough points to make it into the ATP Finals in Turin, which only eight pairings qualify for.

In the quarterfinals in Paris, Venus and Skupski will play against Robert Galloway from the United States and Uruguay’s Ariel Behar. 

Galloway and Behar came into the draw as alternates and were given a bye in the first round, before defeating Hugo Nys and Jan Zielinski in the round of 16.