Australian Open: Bopanna enters pre-quarters

Melbourne, Jan 19 : Indian star Rohan Bopanna and his French partner Édouard Roger-Vasselin reached the pre-quarterfinals of the Australian Open tennis tournament here on Friday.

The 10th seeded Indo-French combination beat off a late fightback from Portugal's João Sousa and Leonardo Mayer of Argentina 6-2, 7-6 (7-3). Bopanna and Roger-Vasselin did not face too much trouble in the opening set. 

Sousa and Mayer gave a stiff fight to their highly rated opponents in the second set before Bopanna and Roger-Vasselin managed to clinch a hard-fought victory.

Bopanna and Roger-Vasselin will have to be at the top of their game in the next round as they will be up against sevetn seeds Mate Pavic of Croatia and Oliver Marach of Austria.

Pavic and Marach had clinched a hard-fought 6-7 (5-7), 6-4, 6-4 victory against the unseeded team of New Zealand's Artem Sitak and Wesley Koolhof of Holland in their pre-quarterfinal clash on Friday.

The Crotian-Austrian pair had registered a comfortable 6-1, 6-4 win over Víctor Estrella Burgos of Dominican Repulic and Federico Delbonis of Argentina in the opening round on Wednesday.