Indian tennis doubles pair Divij Sharan and Purav Raja’s wonderful run at the ATP 250 Swiss Open Gstaad came to an end as they went down fighting to the top seeds Mate Pavic and Michael Venus in the semi-finals on Friday. The Croatian-Kiwi pair came back from a set down to beat the Indians, 3-6, 7-6(4), 10-2 in 1 hour 28 minutes.
The unseeded Indians were the ones who made the brighter start of the two. Riding on their 73% first serves, they broke the top seeds twice while they got themselves broken once.
The second set was more closely-fought as the two teams exchanged one break of serve. The set eventually headed to a tie-break where Sharan and Raja earned a quick mini-break but their joy did not last long.
Pavic and Venus came back with a bang to edge ahead 4-2 in the mini tie-break and then went on to clinch the second set.
With the momentum fully with the seeded pair, the Indians found it hard to counter them in the match tie-break and could only grab two points before the loss.
Raja and Sharan, who reunited this year, have been posting some confidence-boosting results the past few weeks. Right before Wimbledon, they won back-to-back Challenger titles on grass and continued that good run by reaching the semi-finals of ATP Newport last week.
Top seed Feliciano Lopez in singles semi-finals
In singles, top seed Feliciano Lopez made serene progress into the last-four as he beat the rising 20-year-old Swede Elias Ymer, 6-4, 7-6(2). He will next face Dustin Brown, who upset the seventh seed Mikhail Youzhny 6-4, 6-4.
In the third quarter-final of the day, Robin Haase beat Thiago Monteiro, 7-6(2), 7-5 to advance to the semi-finals. He will meet the winner of the match between third seed Albert Ramos-Vinolas and eighth seed Paul-Henri Mathieu.
