Australian Open 2024: Rohan Bopanna-Matthew Ebden Enter Men's Doubles Second Round After Hard-Fought Win

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India's Rohan Bopanna and his partner Matthew Ebden of Australia were forced into two tie-breakers in to reach the second round of the men's doubles in the Australian Open 2024 at the Melbourne Park in Melbourne on Thursday (January 18).

The Indian-Australian duo were asked all sorts of questions by Australian wildcard entrants James Duckworth and Marc Polmans, but registered a 7-6 (5), 4-6, 7-6 (10-2) in the men's doubles opener that lasted 2 hours and 9 minutes on Court 8 to seal their progress.

Both pairs were evenly matched across all facets of the game, but the duo of Bopanna and Ebden clinched 114 points in comparison to the Australian pair's tally of 110.

Even in terms of gaining points from service, the second seeded Indian-Australian duo pulled out 80 service points while the Australian pair managed to clinch 71 points from service.

In the first set, Bopnna and Ebden found themselves down and out with the scoreline reading 5-0 in favour of the Australian pair. They showed remarkable grit and against all odds took the set to tie tie-break. Armed with experience, Bopanna and Ebden clinched the first set.

In the second set, Duckworth and Polmans fought back to level the tie and set a nail-biting decider. Bopanna and Ebden relied on their volley and used the court to their advantage. The Australian pair matched their opponents but in the end, the Indian-Australian duo emerged victorious and moved to the next round.

Bopanna and Ebden will return to action on Friday (January 19) when they face John Millman and Edward Winter in the second round. While two players representing the country won in the form of Bopanna and Balajia, there were three others who exited the tournament on Thursday (January 18).

Earlier in the day, wild cards Anirudh Chandrasekar and Vijay Sundar Prashanth suffered straight sets 3-6, 4-6 loss to Hungarian duo of Marton Fucsovics and Fabian Marozsan in the men's doubles first round match that lasted an hour and 9 minutes.

Also, a dream run ended in singles as Sumit Nagal suffered a second round loss to China's Shang Juncheng by a scoreline of 6-2, 3-6, 5-7, 4-6 in 2 hours and 50 minutes.

Earlier on Tuesday (January 16), Yuki Bhambri and his Dutch partner Robin Haase squandered three match points in the deciding set to go down against Nicolas Barrientos of Colombia and Rafael Matos of Brazil in the men's doubles first round.

The unseeded Indo-Dutch pair lost 6-1 6-7 (8-10) 6-7 (7-10) in the opening round match that lasted two hours and 26 minutes. So, Bopanna is the lone Indian remaining in the ongoing Australian Open.

(With inputs from Agencies)