Bopanna and Ebden reach consecutive Grand Slam doubles finals

Veteran Indian player Rohan Bopanna and his Australian partner, Matthew Ebden, have advanced to their second successive Grand Slam men’s doubles final.

Bopanna, 43, and Ebden, 36, defeated Zhang Zhizhen of China and Tomas Machac of Czech Republic 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 (7) in an Australian Open semifinal Thursday on Rod Laver Arena.

Bopanna and Ebden, now ranked second in men’s doubles, lost to Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury in the US Open final last September. Tournament officials stated Thursday that Ebden and Bopanna, at combined ages of 79 years, will become the oldest No. 1 pairing in tennis history at the end of the tournament. They led 4-1 in the third set before Zhang and Machac forced it to a match tiebreaker.

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“What an epic third set,” Ebden said. “I’ve just got to hand it to my partner. We’ve been fighting since round one; a lot of tough moments, fighting through one-by-one.”

In Saturday’s final, Bopanna and Ebden will play the Italian pair of Simone Bolelli and Andrea Vavassori.

Simone Bolelli and Andrea Vavassori defeated Yannick Hanfmann and Dominik Koepfer of Germany 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 (5) in a later semifinal.

In the first women’s doubles semifinal, Hsieh Su-wei of Taiwan and Elise Mertens of Belgium, the No. 2-seeded team, beat third-seeded Storm Hunter of Australia and Katerina Siniakova of Czech Republic, 7-5, 1-6, 6-3. The other women’s doubles semifinal will be played Friday ahead of Sunday’s final.

The women’s singles semifinals were set for Thursday night, with US Open champion Coco Gauff playing defending champion Aryna Sabalenka, followed by Dayana Yastremska against Zheng Qinwen. The winners will play in the final on Saturday.

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