Tennis: Wins for Michael Venus and Artem Sitak but Marcus Daniell knocked out in Dubai

Michael Venus of New Zealand and Raven Klaasen of South Africa. Photo / Getty

New Zealand doubles player Artem Sitak has continued his fine form by reaching the semi finals at the ATP 250 tournament in Sao Paulo.

Sitak and his Dutch partner Wesley Koolhof have beaten Spaniard's Roberto Carballes Baena 7-5 6-4 in 1 hr 15. Sitak and Koolhof made the final at the ATP tournament in New York two weeks ago and got off to another strong start today with an early break of serve. But Koolhof was broken when serving for the first set at 5-4, the only blip for the Dutch/Kiwi combination.

They broke serve in the next game before Sitak held to close out the first set in 45 minutes. Sitak and Koolhof broke again at the start of the second set and went on to complete a comfortable win.

They will face local Brazilian player Rogerio Dutra Silva and Chile's Roman Jebavy in the semi finals.

Earlier today fresh from winning his 8th doubles title at the ATP tournament in Marseille, Kiwi Michael Venus and his South African partner Raven Klaasen won a tight opening match at the ATP 500 tournament in Dubai.

The 4th seeds beat India's Rohan Bopanna and Frenchman Edouard Roger-Vasselin 6-4, 3-6 10-6 in 1 hr 11. It was close throughout and Venus and Klaasen relied on some clutch serving to win, saving 7 of 8 break points against them.

Venus and Klaasen are now on a five match winning streak after initially taking some time to gel as a new team. They reached the quarter finals at Auckland's ASB Classic in their first tournament together but suffered first round defeats at the Australian Open and in Rotterdam before winning last week's tournament in Marseille. They will face Indian legend Leander Paes and American Jamie Cerretani overnight for a place in the semis.

But fellow Kiwi Marcus Daniell and his British partner Dominic Inglot narrowly lost to the 2nd seeds and reigning US Open champions Romanian Horia Tecau and Jean-Julien Rojer from Curacao.

In a closely fought contest with only three break points in the match, Rojer and Tecau have won 6-3, 6-7 (8) 10-7 in 1 hr 30. Daniell will now head to the US to make his debut at the prestigious Indian Wells Masters where he will team up with world number 18 in singles, Argentine Diego Schwartzman. It will be the first Masters 1000 tournament of Daniell's career.