Paradorn, Paes-Bhupathi favourites

Thailand's Paradorn Srichaphan and India's men's doubles duo of Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi are heavy favourites for Asian Games tenns gold medals.

The lure of bringing home a medal for his nation will bring ATP No. 31 Paradorn to Busan after the greatest win of his career, a 6-4 6-3 quarter-final ouster of world No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt at the ATP Japan Open.

Paradorn lost to Denmark's Kenneth Carlsen in the semi-finals, but his best year on tour has included a second round victory over Andre Agassi at Wimbledon and his first ATP title, coming at Long Island the week before the US Open.

"This could be the biggest, bigger than Andre, because he is number one in the world," Paradorn said. "If I keep my level high, I can play with anybody."

At the Asiad, his rivals are nobodys. Paradorn's draw opens with Kyrgystan's Eduard Koifman. Qatar's Nasser Al-Khelaifi, ranked 1,015, is likely next with Taiwan's No. 189 Lu Yen-Hsun in a quarter-final.

Uzbekistan's Oleg Ogorodov, rated 148th, is the highest rated possible foe in the semi-finals with Paradorn's likely only test a possible final against South Korea's 79th-ranked Lee Hyung-Taik or Japan's No. 110 Takao Suzuki.

"A lot of people expect me to win it, but there are some good players like Lee and Suzuki. I will have to play well to win."

Paes and Bhupathi are re-uniting after splitting up six months ago. They won three Grand Slam doubles titles together. Bhupathi won his first US Open men's doubles crown last month with new partner Max Mirnyi of Belarus.

The desire to bring India a gold medal has brought Bhupathi and Paes together again.

"Some of us have to put our best foot forward rather than sit back and say there is pressure. You just have to go deal with it," Paes said.

"Would you rather we not try to bring India a gold medal?

"We're professionals. We have to go out and be professionals about it and play for our country. I will put myself out there for India. I think in doubles we have the best chance to get a medal."

Having not played together since winning at Majorca five months ago should be no problem, Paes said: "It's like riding a bicycle. You never forget."

Bhupathi and Paes are rated 26th while doubles second seeds Vadim Kutsenko and Dmitry Tomashevich are 483rd.

Thailand's 27th-ranked Tamarine Tanasugarn is the women's top seed but her path is much tougher with Uzbekistan's 40th-rated Iroda Tulyagnova seeded second, 84th-rated South Korean Cho Yoon-Jeong third and Indonesia's No. 91 Angelique Widjaja fourth.

Indonesia's Widjaja and Wynne Prakusya are the top women's doubles seeds. Their doubles victory over Japan's Miho Saeki and Saori Obata brought a team title and Indonesia's first Asian Games gold medal.

China's Zheng Jie and Yan Zi are second seeds, but at 254th in the world are 123 places behind the favourites.

Japan's Shinobu Asagoe and Thomas Shimada are the top mixed doubles seeds with Bhupathi and Manisha Malhotra second and Uzbekistan's Ogorodov and Tulyagnova third.