Mirnyi/Nestor edge past Tsonga/Wawrinka to reach the doubles semis – Rogers Cup 2011
A hard fought victory for the second seeded duo of Max Mirnyi from Belarus and Daniel Nestor from Canada in the quarter-final matchup of Rogers Cup, against the top class pair of Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France and Stanislas Wawrinka
of Switzerland, on Friday afternoon.
Being a part of the ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) Masters Series event, the competition was staged at the Uniprix Stadium in Montreal, Canada. Mirnyi and Nestor toiled extremely hard for one hour and thirty eighth minutes
of play, eventually sealing victory in straight sets 7-5, 7-6(5), to get through to the semi-final of the Montreal Masters.
The contest remained evenly poised all the way, with Tsonga and Wawrinka hanging in the competition till the very last minute. They competed very well in the game and kept moving neck-to-neck with their opponents throughout the
contest but it was only a matter of time that Tsonga and Wawrinka squandered away some vital points to let the second seeded duo away with victory.
Mirnyi and Nestor bagged 39 first serve points in the game, while their opponents very closely followed them with 38 points. Tsonga and Wawrinka frittered away four precious break opportunities in the matchup, which proved extremely
taxing for them in the later parts of the game and eventually caused them to finish the contest on the losing side.
Mirnyi and Nestor crafted 13 break points in the matchup but converted only one of them en route to victory. They kept focused in the game all the way the coordinated with each other with great effectiveness to outplay their aggressive
opponents.
No serve breaks were witnessed in the opening 10 games of the match, with both pairs displaying intense tennis action to get the better of one another. Mirnyi and Nestor squandered away eight break opportunities before they finally
converted the ninth and the most needed one in the 11th game to reach 6-5. The second seeded duo then served out of the first set at 7-5 to get one up in the contest.
Both teams failed to crack in any break point in the following set, driving the set into the tie breaker round. Tsonga and Wawrinka crumbled under the extreme pressure situation in the decider and submitted victory to Mirnyi and
Nestor at 6-7(5), to let them into the semi-finals.
Up next for Mirnyi and Nestor in the semis is the fourth seeded combination of Michael Llodra of France and Nenad Zimonjic of Serbia.
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