The Williamses win the doubles crown

PARIS: Serena Williams and Venus Williams clinched the women's doubles title at Roland Garros on Friday to become only the third team to hold all four Grand Slam titles at the same time.

The top seeded Americans defeated the 12th seeded pairing of Slovenia's Katarina Srebotnik and Kveta Peschke of the Czech Republic 6-2, 6-3 to win their second doubles title in Paris, and 12th Grand Slam title in all.

Martina Navratilova and Pam Shriver (1983-1984) and Gigi Fernandez and Natasha Zvereva (1992-1993) are the only other teams to hold all four majors at the same time.

The Williams sisters, champions here in 1999, have now captured six of the last eight Grand Slam doubles titles.

Paes & Dlouhy in final

On Thursday, third seeds Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy remained on course to defend their title advancing to the final with a 6-4, 6-2 win over 10th seeds Julian Knowle and Andy Ram.

In the final, the Indo-Czech combine will play second seeds Daniel Nestor and Nenad Zimonjic who had an even easier semifinal outing against fourth-seeded Wesley Moodie and Dick Norman, winning 6-0, 6-3. — Agencies