[1]India's Rohan Bopanna and his Pakistani partner Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi crashed out of the men's doubles semi-final at the US Open Tennis Championships with a 2-6, 6-7(4) loss to the Polish pair of Marcin Matkowski and Maruisz Fyrstenberg.
The Indo-Pak Express, seeded fifth and finalists here last year, went down in an 82-minute battle Friday to the sixth-seeded Polish pair, who had defeated India's doubles exponents Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi in the quarterfinals.
With Bopanna's loss, India's challenge in the US Open is over. It is the first Grand Slam final appearance for Matkowski and Fyrstenberg where they will be playing former Wimbledon champions Jurgen Melzer of Austria and Philipp Petzschner of Germany.
Bopanna-Qureshi were rusty in the first set which was completely dominated by Matkowski and Fyrstenberg, who converted two of the three break points.
The India-Pakistan pair put up a tough fight in the second set but failed to keep up the momentum in the tie-breaker to lose the set and the match.
Bopanna and Qureshi earlier Friday had to close out their rain-interrupted quarter-final against Britons Colin Fleming and Ross Hutchins. Qureshi was serving for the match at 6-5, 0/15 in the final set Thursday when rain stopped play. He, however, soon closed out the match 7-5, 2-6, 7-5.
Bopanna will now be heading to Tokyo on Sunday where India will be playing their Davis Cup World Group play-off against Japan Sep 18-20.
"Well, our journey at the 2011 US Open has come to a halt by the Polish train today in the semi-finals," Bopanna wrote on his twitter account.
"On Sunday heading to Japan as it's the time again to wear the India colours and play our Davis Cup tie against Japan in Tokyo next weekend."
Links:
[1] http://archive.asianage.com/bopanna-afpjpgcropdisplayjpg-237