Bryan Brothers escape a match point to dump Melzer/Petzschner – ATP World Tour Finals 2011
World number one duo of Bryan Brothers, Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan, had a stumbling start at the season ending grand finale, the Barclays ATP (Association of Tennis professionals) World Tour Finals on Monday night. They were almost driven out of the contest but a tremendous turnaround from the top seeded duo brought them out as the winner against the seventh seeded dup of Jurgen Melzer of Austria and Philipp Petzschner of Germany, in their opening Round Robin matchup of Group A.
The enthralling contest witnessed a magnificent display of high quality doubles tennis from the two sides and lasted for one hour and thirty nine minutes with the final score settling at 6-7(4), 7-5, 10-7, in the favour of the Bryan Brothers. Being played on the indoor hard courts of the prestigious O2 Arena in London, the matchup featured a number of momentum swings from the two pairs and eventually the American contestants come on top.
The Bryan Brothers had already won the circuit ending mega event on three prior occasions (in 2003, 2004 and 2009) and came to London this time to extend their title count to four. Their sloppy start in the opening set let Melzer and Petzschner to take the upper hand in the contest and the seventh seeded duo went on to reach the match point in the second set. Melzer was serving for a sudden death deuce at 5-3 but the Bryan Brothers skilfully managed to save the match point, eventually breaking their opponents to clinch the second set. It all came down to the super tie-breaker round and the top seeded pair remained focused in the intense pressure situation, cruising through the decider to have a sigh of relief in the end.
It was fifth straight victory for Bob and Mike against Melzer and Petzschner in doubles encounters, leading 5-0 after Monday night’s matchup. The top seeded duo improved 59-14, with eight championship titles, including the glorious Australian Open and Wimbledon, already in their bag for the current year.
The top seeded team will next meet the Swedish-Romanian combination of Robert Lindstedt and Horia Tecau in Round Robin clash on Wednesday evening. Lindstedt and Tecau stunned the fourth seeded Indian duo of Mahesh Bhupathi and Leander Paes in straight sets, 7-6(6), 6-1, in the opening match of Round Robin on Monday night. Lindstedt and Tecau are the one who suffered a championship defeat at the Grand Slam, Wimbledon, this season at the hands of the Bryan brothers and it seems a perfect opportunity for them to avenge the humiliation.
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