Ram/Zimonjic overcome Lacko/Zelenay to bag title – St. Petersburg Open 2012
Former doubles world number one, Nenad Zimonjic of Serbia, partnered with USA’s Rajeev Ram to beat Lukas Lacko and Igor Zelenay of Slovakia in the final of St. Petersburg Open in Russia on Sunday.
Ram and Zimonjic comfortably captured the opener 6-2 but then a meltdown in the second set resulted in losing it 4-6. However, they stepped up again in the match tie-breaker to win it 10-6 and grabbed title on their partnership
debut.
Seeded first at the event, Ram and Zimonjic did not take much time to move ahead, striking in the fourth game and holding their subsequent serve to gain a 4-1 advantage. Serving to stay in the set at 2-5, Lacko and Zelenay failed
to win and went down 2-6.
First half of the second set did not see any of the two teams claiming a breakthrough, levelling the score at 3-3. Lacko and Zelenay hit a blow to the American-Serbian pair in the seventh and capitalised on this single advantage
to win 6-4.
After the score getting tied at one set apiece, the match was taken to a super tie-breaker. Ram/Zimonjic and Lacko/Zelenay went neck to neck till 4-4 but then the American-Serbian combination pressed the accelerator, winning six
of the next eight points to triumph 10-6.
Ram and Zimonjic pounded a total of three aces and 64 percent of the first serves, winning 30 of the 36 points on them in the entire match. The American-Serbian duo also put up a good show on the second deliveries and returns,
pocketing 12 of the 20 and nine of the 17 points on them respectively.
At the end of the match, Ram said, "We played a great first set, really didn't make any mistakes and were on them. Then we had a few chances to get ahead in the second, but they hung in there and credit to them. They played a good
game on my serve and that was it. We re-focused and stepped it up again for the tie-break."
Zimonjic added, "I haven't been playing that well lately, results-wise, and it turned out to be a great decision to come back to St. Petersburg to play with Rajeev. He's a really good player. I played a couple of times against
him.”
One of the best double players in the history of the sport, Zimonjic, captured his 45th tour level title. On the other hand, it was seventh title of Ram’s career.
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