Bhupathi, Bopanna reach quarters
The Indian pair of Mahesh Bhupathi and Rohan Bopanna entered the quarter-finals of the men’s doubles event while Leander Paes exited at the Madrid Open on Thursday.
The sixth-seeded pair of Bhupathi and Bopanna defeated Argentine pair of Juan Monaco and Horacio Zeballos 6-3, 3-6, 10-5 in a hard-fought contest to make it to the last eight of the competition, which is considered to be warm-up event for the French Open.
However it was a disappointing day in office for Paes and his Austrian partner Jurgen Melzer. The German-Czech combination of Tommy Haas and Radek Stepanek hardly broke sweat as they beat the Indo-Austrian combination in straight sets 7-5 6-1. Bhupathi and Bopanna showed more consistency in their both first serve and service. They won 76 per cent points on their first serve compared to 68 per cent of their opponents. The Indian pair fared better in the second serve also as they won 67 per cent points compared to only 50 by the Argentine duo.
In the end, the Indians prevailed as they pipped their opponents by 60 to 53 in the total points in the offing.
Leander and Melzer were off-colour as Haas-Stepanek pair broke their service on four occasions.
In the total number of points, Haas-Stepanek won 58 per cent while Paes-Mlezer could win only 42 per cent of the points.
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