Australian Open 2020: Sharan-Sitak Into 2nd Round, Bopanna-Uchiyama Ousted

India’s Divij Sharan advanced into the second round of the Australian Open doubles on Wednesday along with his Kiwi partner Artem Sitak. The Indo-Kiwi pair defeated the Spanish-Portugal pair of Pablo Carreno Busta of Spain and João Soussa of Portugal 6-4,7-5 in straight sets.

This season did not start well for the Indo-Kiwi pair of Divij-Sitak, as they faced disappointment after they were eliminated in the first round of the Qatar Open. At the same time, in the Auckland Open, Divij-Sitak lost in the quarter-finals.

In the match that lasted an hour and 28 minutes Divij Sharan, India’s 2nd-ranked doubles player, and Artem Sitak won 69 percentage 1st serve points and hit 27 winners to get their Australian Open campaign to a strong start.

Having booked s spot in the second round of the Australian Open the Indo-Kiwi pair of Divij-Sitak will be locking horns with the winner of the 1st-round match between 10th seeds Mate Pavio-Bruno Soares and Ben Molachlan and Luke Bambridge.

Other Indian tennis great Rohan Bopanna who had teamed up with Yasutaka Uchiyama of Japan were also knocked out of the tournament after they went down fighting 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 to 13th seeds Mike and Bob Bryan. The match lasted one hour 17 minutes. However, the 39-year-old Bopanna‘s hopes at the Australian Open are not completely over. He will feature alongside Sania Mirza in missed doubles.

Earlier, India’s top seed Prajnesh Gunneswaran, who was lucky to get the ticket of the main draw even after losing in the qualifiers, was shown the door in the first round of the Australian Open on Tuesday. He was overwhelmed 6-4 6-2 7-5 by Japan’s 144th ranked Taro Ito of Japan.

Prajnesh was playing the main round of a Grand Slam for the fifth consecutive time. Had he won this match, he would have faced World No 2 Serbia’s Novak Djokovic.