LAHORE – The Indo-Pak duo of Pakistan’s Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi and India’s Rohan Bopanna had a nerve-wrecking match in the second round of the Australian Open. The French pair of Arnaud Clement and Jeremy Chardy gave them a tough time before losing in a three setter.
Everything looked like a walk in the park for the Indo-Pak pair in the first set, which they won 6-3 when they broke Clement’s serve at 4-3 up and easily served out the set. For the most part of the second set, Aisam and Rohan’s pair looked dominating and were pressurizing the French pair with sizzling winners but suddenly at 4-5, the French pair came up with a few great returns on Aisam’s serve and broke his serve to secure the set with a 6-4 score. This suddenly changed the momentum of the match in favour of the French pair who capitalized on it and managed an early break of serve in the third set. The match was going clearly in favour of the French with a score of 1-4 when the Indo-Pak Express suddenly woke up.
Their serve as well as return quality improved and the French pair was unable to match. The Indo-Pak duo went on to win next five games in a row with three on their own serve and two by securing serve breaks on Chardy and Clement’s serves. In the last 16 round, the Indo-Pak pair will be facing a strong pair of former world number one doubles player Nenad Zimonjic of Serbia and Michael Llodra of France.
