By Ajaydeep Grewal – 7th August, 2019
Rohan Bopanna and Denis Shapovalov progressed to the second round of the Rogers Cup with an upset win over the 4 th seed French pairing of Nicolas Mahut and Edouard Roger-Vasselin. The Indo-Canadian pair won 4-6, 6-1, 10-6 in just over an hour and will now face either Basilashvili/Struff or Edmund/Fritz. The match took place on Court 9 of the IGA stadium in Montreal and there was no dearth of support for the Indo-Canadian pair as a large number of Canadians turned out to support their local hero Shapovalov and his partner Bopanna.
The French pairing, who reached the final of Wimbledon this year, dominated the proceedings initially in the match. They definitely looked as the more settled pair in the first set as they held their serves with ease and forced the Indo-Canadian pair to labour a lot for their service holds. Finally, in the 9th Game of the set, Shapovalov was broken and the French pair closed out the set 6-4.
The second set was a complete contrast to the first one. Bopanna/Shapovalov had found their rhythm by then and they broke Roger-Vasselin twice to completely dominate the set before closing it 6-1. The Indo-Canadian pair also dominated the match tie-break right from the start. They raced to a 3-0 lead and never allowed the French pairing to come back into the tie-break before eventually closing out the set and the match at 10-6.
The Bopanna/Shapovalov pairing has tasted some success this year, having made the final of the ATP 250 Mercedes Cup in Stuttgart on grass, having beaten the likes of Bryan brothers, Kyrgios/Reid, Pouille/Tsonga.
