There were some good results in men’s doubles for Indians on the ATP Tour as both Rohan Bopanna and Divij Sharan reached the quarter-finals of their respective tournaments.
Bopanna and partner Pablo Carreno Busta of Spain beat Nenad Zimonjic of Sebria and Rudolf Molleker 6-3, 5-7, 10-3 in the first round of the ATP 500 Hamburg Open in Germany. They will play the third seeded pair of Oliver Marach and Jurgen Melzer next.
Sharan, partnering Jonathan Erlich, set up a quarter-final clash with the legendary Bryan brothers, Mike and Bob, in the ATP 250 Atlanta Open in USA.
Sharan and Erlich came from behind to beat Miomir Kecmanovic and Robert Lindstedt 2-6 6-3 13-11 in the first round on Thursday.
The Bryans, who have won more than 100 ATP doubles titles together, ousted fellow American wild card pair of Christopher Eubanks and Donald Young 6-4 6-2 in their opener.
In the bottom half of the draw, veteran Leander Paes and his partner Marius Copil made a first-round exit following a close 6-7(2) 4-6 defeat to British-American combination of Taylor Fritz and Cameron Norrie. Last week, Paes had made an impressive run to the semi-final of Hall of Fame Open in Newport with Marcus Daniell, in the process becoming the oldest ATP semi-finalist since John McEnroe in 2006.
Elsewhere, Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan and Purav Raja lost to Marc-Andrea Huesler Jakub Paul 5-7, 4-6 in quarter-final of the ATP 250 event in Gstaad, Switzerland. The all–Indian pair had beaten second seeds Denys Molchanov and Igor Zelenay 6-4, 6-2 in the first round.
In Binghamton, Ramkumar Ramanathan squandered a one-set advantage to lose to lower-ranked American wild card, Alexander Ritschard, for a first- round exit from the Challenger event.
The second seeded Indian, who got a first-round bye, lost 6-2 6-7(3) 2-6 to the 443rd ranked American in the second round of the USD 54160 hard court tournament.
Enjoying a career-best singles rank of 167 and coming into the event in good form, it was a surprise defeat for the Indian.
He had ended runner-up at the Surbiton Trophy Challenger and won the Guzzini Challenger in Italy recently.
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