top seeds at the US$1,34 million hardcourt tournament.And the duo have received a first-round-bye at the Tier I event and will only be in action later this week where they will face the winners of the first-round match between Jarmila Gajdosova of Slovakia and Australia’s Bryanne Stewart and the fellow unseeded pair of Italy’s Tathiana Garbin and Shar Peer of Israel.
The two teams were scheduled to meet late last night. In Toronto, Black and Huber, the 2007 Australian Open and Wimbledon champions, are gunning for their seventh doubles title of the year.
The year’s most successful team and recent San Diego champions, Black and Huber also look almost certain to qualify now for the season-ending Sony Ericsson Championships in Madrid, Spain, in November after building a healthy lead over second placed Lisa Raymond and Samantha Stosur in the world doubles rankings.
Black and Huber, who currently head the world rankings with 5 170 points, are 1 682 points clear of American Raymond and Stosur of Australia.
Chinese Taipei’s Australian Open runners-up, Chan Yung-Jan and Chuang Chia-Jung and Wimbledon finalists Katerina Srebotnik of Slovenia and Japan’s Ai Sugiyama hold third and fourth positions in the four-team Race for Madrid.
The Sony Ericsson Championships will gather the Top Eight singles players and Top Four doubles teams from the regular 2007 Sony Ericsson WTA Tour season, before they battle it out for the season-ending titles and a share of the US$3 million purse.
The defending champions are Belgium’s Justine Henin (singles) and Raymond and Stosur (doubles).
The Sony Ericsson Championships will be played for the second time at the Recinto Ferial Casa de Campo in Madrid from November 6-11.
Meantime Zimbabwe’s doubles specialist Kevin Ullyett and his Australian partner Paul Hanley have arrived in Ohio, United States, for the US$2,45 million Western and Southern Financial Group Masters tournament which got underway on Monday.
Ullyett and Hanley, who lost to India’s Mahesh Bhupathi and Pavel Vizner of the Czech Republic in the final of the men’s Rogers Masters tournament in Montreal, Canada, on Sunday, are seeded fifth in Ohio.
They have received a first-round bye at the hardcourt tournament which they are using as part of their preparations for the fourth and final Grand Slam of the year the US Open which starts in two weeks time at Flushing Meadows in New York.