Melbourne, Jan 23:
India’s Rohan Bopanna and his Hungarian partner Timea Babos entered the quarterfinals of the Australian Open mixed doubles event with a straight-set win, here today.
The fifth-seeded pairing of Bopanna and Babos beat USA’s Vania King and Croatia’s Franko Skugor 6-4 6-4 at the Melbourne Park.
The match, which lasted a little over an hour, saw Bopanna and Babos break in the third game of the opening set to take a 2-1 lead.
In the fifth game of the second set, Bopanna and Babos broke Skugor’s and made it 3-2. The Indo-Hungarian pair sent down eight aces compared to their opponents’ five.
Bopanna and Babos had dispatched the unseeded Australian pairing of Whittington and Perez 6-2 6-4 in the previous round.
They will face the unseeded pair of Juan Sebastian Cabal from Colombia and Abigail Spears from the USA in the quarterfinals tomorrow.
Bopanna now remains the only Indian in title contention at the Australian Open.
Leander Paes, Purav Raja, Divij Sharan and Bopanna himself lost in the third round of the men’s doubles competition yesterday. PTI
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