2010 Barclays ATP World Tour Final: Wimbledon Champions secure first event win
The Doubles Group A matches continued as the World Tour Finals (WTF) entered the third day of play on Tuesday at the O2 Arena, London. Four teams battled it out on the courts to ensure their stay in the run for the WTF title.
Kicking off the doubles action for the day was the rising team of Austrian Jurgen Melzer and German Philipp Petzschner as they took on the Czech Indian pair of Lukas Dlouhy and Leander Paes. Having met only once before in the season
opening event at Brisbane the head-to-head score 1-0 was led by Dlouhy and Paes. However, in a match that lasted one hour and forty-five minutes the Austrian-German pair was able to level the score after turning the tables on Dlouhy and Paes.
Melzer and Petzschner gained entry into the season finale after winning the Wimbledon doubles title this year. Making their debut this year, the Austrian-German duo got off to a bad start losing their opening match to the Bryans;
however, they were able to keep their hopes for the semi-final alive after denying their opponents their first ever win. Dlouhy and Paes, who are making their third appearance in the season finale this year, have failed to win a single match making their career
event record 0-8. Losing their opening match to the Poles, Mariusz Fyrstenberg and Marcin Matkowski, Dlouhy and Paes have dropped down to a 0-2 record in the event this year.
Having lost their opening matches, both teams were trying desperately to take the lead. Melzer’s team rushed to a 5-2 lead in the opener though Dlouhy-Paes fought back taking the set into tiebreaker. Going head-to-head in the tiebreaker,
neither team was willing to give up the lead. The score was levelled for eighteen straight points. It was at 9-9 that Melzer and Petzschner finally caught a break and won two successive points to win the tiebreaker.
Coming into the second set, third seeds Dlouhy and Paes took an early lead of 4-1; however, Melzer and Petzschner soon caught up levelling the score at 4-4. The Austrian German duo could not maintain their form and lost the next
two sets to take the match into a tiebreaker.
Determined to ensure their first win at the season finale, Dlouhy and Paes took an early lead into the match tiebreaker. Enjoying the comfortable lead of four points at 8-4, the pair was almost all set to win the tiebreaker; however,
in a surprising turn of event, Melzer and Petzschner snatched the victory from their opponent’s grasps. Winning six straight points at 4-8, the Austrian-German duo was able to secure their first ever win at the season finale. The final match score was 7-6(9),
6-4, 10-8.
Melzer and Petzschner will next play Fyrstenberg and Matkowski whereas Dlouhy and Paes will play the Bryans next. Although Dlouhy and Paes are down to 0-2 in the event, it is still not confirmed whether they are out of the running.
Depending on the American-Poles matchup tonight and whether the pair can defeat the Bryans in two sets on Wednesday, Dlouhy and Paes still might have a bleak chance of making it to the semis.
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