Chandigarh, Feb 8 (UNI) Indian duo of Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan and Purav Raja put up a spirited fight against fourth seeded pair of Robin Haase and Matwe Middelkoop of Netherlands in the closely contested doubles quarter-final of the € 524,340 ATP Tennis Tournament in Sofia (Bulgaria).
The pair just managed to clinch the sem-final spot after recording a close win in two evently contested sets, both going into tie-breaker 7-6 (6), 7-6 (10) in one hour and 32 minutes. The Netherlands pair fired 13 aces and committed six double faults while Nedunchezhiyan/Raja had five aces to their credit. They did not commit any doubles faults.
Nedunchezhiyan/Raja won 82 per cent points (41/50) on first service and 69 per cent (20/29) on second service. Their opponents won 80 per cent points (43/54) on first service and 50 per cent (15/30) on second service. Both pairs saved two out of three break points each and also won one out of three break points apiece.
Nedunchezhiyan/Raja now fce Nikola Mektic of Croatia and Jurgen Melzer of Austria in the semi-final. Nikola Mektic and Jurgen Melzer also won a hard-fought battle against Italian duo of Simone Bolelli and Andreas Seppi 6.7 (5), 7-6 (5), 10-6 in one hour and 44 seconds.
In quarter-final match, Indian pair of Rohan Bopanna and Divij Sharan will face Bulgarian pair of Alexander Donski and Alexandar Lazarov in doubles quarter-final. In pre-quarter Bopanna/Sharan had beaten Mate Pavic (Coratia) and Nenad Zimonjic (Serbia) 7-8 (2), 6-2.
UNI XC JAL 0716