French Open: Bopanna-Qureshi out of the men’s doubles tournament
The Indo Pak pair of Rohan Bopana and Aisam Ul Haq Qureshi bowed out of the men’s doubles competition in the French Open Tennis Tournament on Sunday. The French duo of Julien Benneteau and Michael Llodra defeated the pair with a 5-7, 3-6 score line. Consequently, Leander Paes is the only representation left from the Indian side in the tournament as Max Mirnyi and Mahesh Bhupathi were kicked out of the tournament last Saturday. Sania Mirza is not taking part in the French Open due to her injury problems.
Bopana and Aisam failed to avail a single break chance. What was even more dramatic was that the pair missed their serve in each set. In Indo-Pak combination only managed to win 150 points while the French duo went on to win gather 250 points in all.
As a pair, Bopana and Aisam share a descent tennis history with a title at the SA Tennis Open in Johannesburg to start their doubles journey in international tennis. They also ended up as runners up last month at the Grand Prix Hassan II in Casablanca.
Born on 4 March 1980, Rohan Bopana is a professional tennis player from India. Being fond of the game since childhood, Bopana started playing tennis at a young age of 11 years. His career high ranking of 230 in the ATP rankings was achieved on the 27th February, 2006. After pairing with Prakash Amritaj, the Indian tennis player went on to win his first ATP doubles final at the Chennai Open. However, Michal Mertinak and Petr Pala defeated the pair. He then met Roger Federer later on in June. Paired with Mustafa, Bopana managed to go through into his second final in Mumbai.
The Pakistani tennis star Aisam Ul Haq was born on March 17, 1980. He is ranked as the number one tennis player in Pakistan. Being the former number three from Asia, his highest singles ranking in the ATP table is 103.Having a serve and volley playing style; he enjoys a good history in the ATP junior tennis tournaments. Aisam has also been the highest ranked player of Pakistan in 1998. In 2002, he was initially paired with Amir Hadad from Israel. The pair went on to play at the U.S Open followed by the Wimbledon Championship. Both the players kept their religious grudges aside and played with a high spirit of sportsmanship. They were awarded with the Arthur Ashe Humanitarian Award for playing together as a pair despite the odds. Aisam Ul Haq has so far been a successful player for Pakistan after having won the highest number of Davis Cup matches for his country.
Aisam stepped onto a tennis court for the first time at the age of 14. He was sponsored by ITF for two years when he was just 16 years old. Since then, he went in to win many titles to his name such as the Pakistan International Junior Championships, the LTA International Junior Championships in Roehampton by beating Andy Roddic, Taylor Dent and Olivier along with the Casablanca Cup in Mexico.
The shinning tennis star at that time was ranked amongst the top 20 junior players in the world. The LTA coached him while he was playing in the international circuit as a junior player. Whereas after turning pro in 1998, Aisam was coached by Robert Davis, an American sports writer. The tennis player is currently under the supervision of Rodrigo Nascimento who is a Brazilian.
Bopana has played for the Davis Cup Team for India on a number of occasions. In the 2007 Homan Cup, Bopana ended up with two points from all his matches. In the middle of 2007, he joined hands with Pakistani tennis star Aisam Ul Haq Qureshi. The pair was nick named the Indo Pak Express. They won four consecutive Challenger titles. The India Pakistan combination went on to win the final of the Kingfisher Airlines Open held in Mumbai. On the 6th of August, 2007, the pair completed a hat trick of doubles titles. The pair seems to have an interesting chemistry with each other which will definitely help them a great deal for their future tours.
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