Venus off to a winning start in Portugal

Michael Venus has teamed up with Britain’s Jamie Murray this week with his regular doubles partner Tim Puetz nursing an ankle injury.

Venus and Murray are the top seeds at the ATP 250 tournament in Estoril in Portugal and have won through to the quarter finals.

They’ve beaten Poland’s Lukasz Kubot and Dutchman Robin Hasse 7-5, 2-6,10-5 in an hour and 28 minutes.

Venus and Murray will take on Pakistan’s Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi and Kazakhstan’s Aleksandr Nedovyesov in the quarter finals.

Meanwhile the women’s doubles draw is out for the WTA 1000 tournament in Madrid and Erin Routliffe and her Polish partner Alicja Rosolska have copped a tough one. They take on the Japanese pair of Eri Hozumi and Makoto Ninomiya in the first round with the winners to meet top seeds Aussie Storm Sanders and China’s Shuai Zhang in the second round.