Indian doubles star Rohan Bopanna and his Australian partner Matthew Ebden started their campaign at the US Open with a comfortable win in the men’s doubles first round on Wednesday.
Bopanna and Ebden, who had reached the Wimbledon semi-finals, took 55 minutes to beat the all-Australian team of Aleksandar Vukic and Christopher O’Connell 6-4, 6-2.
Playing on Court 15 at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Centre in New York, the Indo-Australian pair earned the first break of the match at 4-4. They broke Vukic’s serve at love to go up 5-4 before Bopanna served out the set comfortably.
With momentum on the side of the sixth seeded pair, Bopanna and Ebden found an early break in the second set, breaking O’Connell to go up 2-1. O’Connell’s serve was again targeted in the seventh game, with the seeded team getting a break again.
Up 5-2 in the second set, Ebden held serve comfortably to seal the match.
They next take on the winner of the match between the all-American team of Aleksandar Kovacevic and Nicolas Moreno De Alboran, and Kazakhstan’s Andrey Golubev and Russia’s Roman Safiullin.
The two other Indians in the men’s doubles draw will be in action on Thursday. Saketh Myneni and partner Aslan Karatsev take on Switzerland’s Marc-Andrea Huesler and Serbian Laslo Djere.
Meanwhile Yuki Bhambri and Brazilian partner Marcel Demoliner face Monaco’s Hugo Nys and Poland’s Jan Zielinski.
