India's Rohan Bopanna reached his first Grand Slam semifinal in seven years after he and his Dutch partner Matwe Middelkoop rallied to beat Lloyd Glasspool and Henri Heliovaara in the men's doubles quarterfinals of the French Open, here.
The Indo-Dutch pair eked out a 4-6 6-4 7-6 (3) win over the British-Finnish combination in a hard-fought contest on Monday night.Bopanna last reached the semifinals of a tennis Major at the 2015 Wimbledon Championships when he had teamed up with Romania's Florin Mergea and lost in a gruelling five-setter to Jean-Julien Rojer and Horia Tecau.Bopanna, 42, and Middelkoop, 38, will face 12th seeds Marcelo Arevalo and Jean-Julien Roger on Thursday in the last four.
The Bopanna and Middelkoop squandered the opening set but dished out a superb fightback to win the next two as emerge victories.In the decider, the Indo-Dutch pair showed tremendous mental fortitude to fightback from 3-5 down to take the match to a super tiebreak.They were again 0-3 behind but won 10 straight points to come up trumps.Bopanna and Middelkoop had saved five match points to knock out Mate Pavic and Nikola Mektic, the reigning Wimbledon champions, from the Roland Garros, on Saturday.
Meanwhile, it's all over for Russia's World Number 2 Daniil Medvedev when he succumbed to Croatian Marin Cilic who won by 6-2 6-3 6-2 in a one-sided contest at the French Open on Monday, according to hindustantimes.com.
Daniil Medvedev File Picture
Back to Marin, he returns to the quarters after a gap of four years.
Marin who won the 2014 U.S. Open and seeded 20th in the French Open, was indomitable from the beginning wrapping up the match in an hour and 45 minutes.
Medvedev was in the match winning all the three previous meetings against the Croatian but had to end up on the losing side this time.
"It was absolutely a fantastic match from the first point to the last," Cilic said during an interview on court.
"I enjoyed the atmosphere, enjoyed the night session here, played incredible tennis, one of the best matches of my career from start to finish."
