Indians win Adelaide International in an upset

It was Rohan Bopanna’s 20th ATP doubles title and first for Ramkumar Ramanathan, who was playing only in his second summit clash at this level, having ended a runner-up at the Hall of Fame Tennis Championships in 2018. Bopanna’s excellent service returns at crucial times and Ramkumar’s all-round game tilted the match in their favour.
For the first-time, in a team, on the ATP Tour, India’s Bopanna and Ramkumar won the Adelaide International doubles trophy with a hard-fought 7-6 (6) 6-1 win over top seeds Ivan Dodig and Marcelo Melo here on Sunday. In the one hour and 21 minutes contest, the Indians saved all the four break points they faced and broke their rivals twice.
After saving an early breakpoint, Bopanna and Ramkumar upped their game. Bopanna then saved another breakpoint and converted the deciding deuce point to make it 4-4. Serving to stay afloat in the set at 5-6, the Indian pair was up 40-30 when Dodig created a winner on Bopanna’s serve that whizzed past Ramkumar on his right but the big-serving Coorgi hit an ace to drag it to a tie-breaker.
It was one-way traffic in the second set with the Indians dominating all through.