Bopanna-Ebden, Yuki-Haase pairs advance, Nagal exits from Dubai Tennis C’ship

Bopanna and Ebden, who won the Australian Open last month, took one hour and 41 minutes to get the better of Mansouri and Qureshi 7-6(4) 7-6(5) in the round of 16 on Tuesday night.

File image of Rohan Bopanna and Matthew Ebden. | Photo Credit: AFP

Top seeds Rohan Bopanna and his Australian partner Matthew Ebden entered the men’s doubles quarterfinals of the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships with a straight set win over the Tunisian-Pakistani pair of Skander Mansouri and Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi here.

Bopanna and Ebden, who won the Australian Open last month, took one hour and 41 minutes to get the better of Mansouri and Qureshi 7-6(4) 7-6(5) in the round of 16 on Tuesday night.

Bopanna and Ebden, who made their first outing since winning the men’s doubles title at the Australian Open, will face Ariel Behar of Uruguay and Czech Adam Pavlasek in the quarterfinals.

Another Indian, Yuki Bhambri and his Dutch partner Robin Haase also progressed to the quarterfinals, defeating Kazakhstan’s Alexander Bublik and Adrian Mannarino of France 6-7(6) 6-3 10-8 in a round of 16 match.

Yuki and Haase will next face the winner of the match between the Belgian duo of Sander Gille and Joran Vliegen and third seed English-Kiwi pair of Jamal Murray and Michael Venus.

However, it was curtains for India in men’s singles after the country’s top player Sumit Nagal exited in the round of 32.

Nagal lost 4-6 7-5 1-6 against Italy’s Lorenzo Sonego.