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KARACHI: They may be split on loyalties for the World Cup semi-final between India and Pakistan, but Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi and Rohan Bopanna came together to oust Dick Norman and Michal Martinak at the Miami Masters.
The ‘IndoPak Express’ battled the big-serving Belgian-Slovak pair for an hour and 45 minutes before making it to the quarterfinals of the ATP Master Series tournament.
The first set saw a service break from the South Asian duo, giving them a 2-0 lead, which was later squandered. The set continued to see-saw as both teams set up several break points but failed to convert them, taking the set into a tie-break. After winning a mini-break point, Qureshi and Bopanna bagged the set 7-4.
Norman and Mertinak raised their game in the second set as they broke their opponents’ serve for a 1-0 lead first up. The Europeans maintained the lead throughout the set to end it with a 6-3 score.
At one set all the match tie-breaker came into play, where Norman and Mertinak managed to get a double break advantage by hitting superb returns on serve and were soon sitting comfortable with 6-1 score. At this point, the IndoPak Express upped their tempo and won the next eight points to go 9-6 up in the super tie-breaker.
Two great serve returns by Norman and Mertinak meant the IndoPak Express were deprived of the win. At 8-9, however, Norman hit a double fault and lost the decider 8-10.
The IndoPak Express will face Oliver Marach (Austria) and Janko Tipsarevic (Seriba), who defeated the world number one pair of Mike Bryan and Bob Bryan.
Earlier, Qureshi and Bopanna beat top German player Philipp Kohlschreiber and Rajeev Ram of USA 6-3, 7-6 (5).
