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A day after confirming his status as next week’s new world No. 1 in doubles, Rohan Bopanna booked his spot in the final of the Australian Open for the first time. The Indian and his Australian partner Matthew Ebden beat Zhang Zhizhen of China and Tomas Machac of Czech Republic 6-3, 3-6, 7-6(10-7) in the men’s doubles semi-final on Thursday.
The second-seeded pair will take on the Italian combination of Simone Bolelli and Andrea Vavassori in the final on Saturday looking for their first Grand Slam title together.
Bopanna and Ebden have made their second straight Slam final, after also doing so at the 2023 US Open where they lost to Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury from being a set up. The 43-year-old Indian, in his third major men’s doubles final, is hunting for his first men’s doubles Slam title after also falling one step short at the 2010 US Open. If he does get over the line on Saturday, Bopanna will become the oldest man to win a Slam doubles title in history.
According to tournament officials, Bopanna and Ebden, 36, will also become the oldest world No. 1 doubles pair (combined age of 79 years) in history at the end of the tournament.
Bopanna, who made his debut at the season-opening Slam way back in 2008, has had underwhelming results at Melbourne Park over the years. Although he made the mixed doubles final last year partnering Sania Mirza, he had never made it past the third round in doubles.
But, in company of the Australian Ebden, the two have got going this year and lived up to their seeding. The pair has been impressive in tie-breaker situations, particularly the high-pressure match-tiebreakers from where they needed to get out in the first round as well as the semi-final on Thursday.
After bagging the first set but surrendering the second, Bopanna and Ebden were in control of the decider at 4-1 up before Zhang and Machac forced the contest to a 10-point shootout. The more experienced Indian-Aussie pair held its nerve it in, with Bopanna sealing it off with an ace.
“I think the experience of playing together helped us come through that super-tiebreak there, for sure,” Bopanna said.
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