Paes, Bhupathi Miami win inspired by World Cup

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Indian doubles stars Mahesh Bhupathi and Leander Paes said their Miami Masters triumph was inspired by watching their country's World Cup win over Sri Lanka.

The duo watched the Mumbai final, where India defeated Sri Lanka by six wickets, on a live stream before going on court to defeat Max Mirnyi and Daniel Nestor 6-7 (5/7), 6-2, 10-5.

"It gave us extra motivation. It’s a big deal for our country and kudos to the whole team," said Bhupathi.

Paes added: "I just want to congratulate the team, all of them. Great job boys."

The victory takes the Indians ahead of Americans Bob and Mike Bryan in the 2011 ATP Doubles Team Rankings and in the battle to qualify for the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals. Bhupathi, however, chose not to be ecstatic about the new rankings.

"It's still early for us. The season is broken down into four segments - this is just the first of them. If we're still No. 1 after the US Open, then we'll start getting excited," said Bhupathi.

It was Paes and Bhupathi's second title together this year, following success at their home event in Chennai to start the season.

"The key (to winning) was just fighting as a team. We didn't play our best match of the week. All four of us were tentative in the beginning," Bhupathi said.

The third-seeded Indians served for the first set up 6-5, only to be get broken and even lose the tie-break. Some well-struck returns by the Belarusian-Canadian duo helped the No. 2 seeds win a tight first set.

"We had a chance to win that set but we did not take it and threw away the breaker pretty much," Bhupathi said.

The Indians stepped up their game in the second set and a double fault by Nestor in the fourth game allowed them to nose ahead 3-1 and soon it was set all. They kept up the momentum in the tie-break to close the match.