Bopanna, Mergea go down in Paris Masters thriller

The Indo-Romanian team put up a brave fight but ultimately went down 5-7, 7-6 (4), 10-12 in their men’s doubles quarter-final match against Marcelo Melo and Ivan Dodig at Paris Masters.

Rohan Bopanna (L) and Florin Mergea converted two of the eight break points they received; their opponents converted three of six.

Eighth seeded pair of Rohan Bopanna and Florin Mergea went down 5-7, 7-6 (4), 10-12 in their men’s doubles quarter-final match against Marcelo Melo and Ivan Dodig at the Paris Masters. The Indo-Romanian team put up a brave fight but ultimately accepted defeat in 1 hour and 34 minutes at the 3,288,530 Euro ($3.5 million) hard-court tournament here on Friday.

Melo-Dodi converted three of the six points received (50%) and 83 of the 160 total points played (51%) to snatch victory in the close contest. Bopanna-Mergea could only manage to win two of the nine break points received (22%).

That gave the Brazilian-Croatian duo a slight advantage in the neck-and-neck contest as they broke ahead in a crucial phase of the match to claim the first set 7-5. The second set was equally fought with both teams holding onto their serves, Bopanna-Mergea restoring parity after snatching the tie-breaker.

That set up the match nicely as both refused to give each other an inch. It was a matter of who blinks first and ultimately the Bopanna-Mergea duo did. Bopanna and Mergea had earlier defeated the Colombian pair of Juan Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah 6-7(3), 6-4, 10-5 in the second round on Wednesday.