India’s top doubles players Leander Paes and Rohan Bopanna were ousted from the US Open men’s doubles competition even as Sania Mirza progressed in the mixed doubles event with her Croatian partner Iv
India’s top doubles players Leander Paes and Rohan Bopanna were ousted from the US Open men’s doubles competition even as Sania Mirza progressed in the mixed doubles event with her Croatian partner Ivan Dodig.
Paes and his German partner Andre Begemann lost a close first round encounter against the French-Israeli pair of Stephane Robert and Dudi Sela in just under two hours by a 6-2, 5-7, 4-6 margin.
Bopanna and Denmark’s Frederik Nielsen were blown away by USA’s Brian Baker and Marcus Daniell of New Zealand 2-6, 6-7 (5).
However, there was some cheer for the Indian fans as Sania and Dodig made a fluent start to their campaign with a 6-4, 6-4 win over the US pair of Donald Young and Taylor Townsend in 62 minutes.
Bopanna also played his mixed doubles first round match later in the evening alongside Canadian Gabriela Dabrowski beating the US duo of Noah Rubin and Jamie Loeb 7-5, 6-4 in 67 minutes.
In the junior girls’ event, Pranjala Yadlapalli beat American Victoria Emma 6-3, 6-2.
Bopanna and Nielsen were broken twice before they conceded the first set 6-2. It was turning out to be a cakewalk for the Kiwi-US pair as they were ready to serve for the match at 5-3 before Bopanna-Nielsen broke back to make it 5-5 raising visions of a fightback.
With the help of a mini-break, the Indo-Danish pair were up 3-0 in the tie-breaker only to commit lot of unforced errors before losing the match.
