Brunstrom/Shamasdin takes down Knowle/Zelenay to reach the doubles semis – Suisse Open Gstaad 2011
Fourth seeded duo of Johan Brunstrom of Sweden and Adil Shamasdin of Canada blasted their way to the semi-finals of Credit Agricole Suisse Open Gstaad after defeating the unseeded duo of Julian Knowle from Austria and Igor Zelenay
of Slovakia in the quarters on Friday afternoon.
The contest was staged on the clay courts of the Credit Agricole Arena in Gstaad, Switzerland, with Brunstrom and Shamasdin wrapping up victory in straight sets 7-6(4), 6-1, to reach the round of four of the ATP (Association of
Tennis Professionals) World Tour 250 tournament. Knowle and Zelenay hung in the matchup for one hour and nine minutes before they eventually fell to the belligerent fourth seeded pair to end their voyage at Suisse Open.
Intense tennis was witnessed in the opening set, which was stretched to the tie breaker round before Brunstrom and Shamasdin bagged it. Knowle and Zelenay lost all their steam in the following set and proved to be a wall of sand,
crumbling against the fury of the fourth seeded duo in a humiliating manner.
The opener took off with aggressive tennis from both sides early on. Knowle and Zelenay served magnificently with a precision of 67 per cent and reeled odd 17 first serve points on it, with their opponents also collecting 17 out
of 21 points. No serve breaks were seen in the opening seven games but Knowle and Zelenay made their first move in the eighth game to break into a 5-3 lead. Brunstrom and Shamasdin retaliated immediately in the very next game to fritter away their advantage
and brought the scores back on even terms at 5-5.
A decisive tie breaker was enforced into play once the scores got dead locked at 6-6. Brunstrom and Shamasdin shifted their gears in the decider and allowed just four points to their opponents to wrap up the first set at 7-6(4).
Once getting into their momentum in the game, Brunstrom and Shamasdin never looked back in the rest of the game. The fourth seeded duo proved destructive in the following set and cracked in two consecutive serve breaks to race
away to victory at 6-1. Knowle and Zelenay held serve in just one game before they surrendered the second set to let Brunstrom and Shamasdin into the semi-finals of Credit Agricole Suisse Open Gstaad.
Brunstrom and Shamasdin will take on the second seeded team of Christopher Kas of Germany and Alexander Peya of Austria in the semi-final clash on Saturday.
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