At the Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York on Friday, Bopanna and Matthew Ebden lost to Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury 6-2, 3-6, 4-6 in a prestigious final.
As he and his Australian partner Matthew Ebden lost to Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury in a prestigious final on Friday at the Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York, Rohan Bopanna's ambition of winning the men's doubles title at the US Open was dashed for the second time. Ram and Salisbury made history by winning the US Open three times in a row in men's doubles. Overall, this was their fourth Grand Slam.
In his second US Open men's doubles final, Bopanna took the court. The Bryan brothers defeated him and his Pakistani partner Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi in the championship match the last time, in 2010.
This time, though, it didn't seem as though Bopanna's desire would come true. He and Ebden sacrificed everything they had. Rajeev Ram's opening serve was broken by their opponents to immediately put strain on the seasoned duo. Ram and Salisbury were caught off guard as Bopanna and Ebden both turned on.
Ram and Salisbury had no opportunity of mounting a comeback in the opening set thanks to Ebden, who played flawlessly as he has so frequently throughout this tournament. The Indo-Australian pair made it 5-2 after two breaks in the seventh game, and they held with no errors to secure a decisive first-set lead in the championship match.
However, Ram and Salisbury made a formidable comeback in the second set. Ram and Salisbury were simply too good, whereas Bopanna and Edben did not commit many mistakes. By going on a double break and holding to their own serve to win the second set and send the match into a decider, they dealt the sixth seeds a taste of their own medicine.
Bopanna saved some of his best tennis for the fourth set, making history by becoming the oldest man to play in a Grand Slam final at the age of 43. With his back against the wall and three break points down, Bopanna played some remarkable tennis to maintain his serve. In the fourth game, Bopanna and Ebden came extremely close to breaking the tie, but Ram maintained his composure and fended off three break points to keep the score at 2-2.
.The match's most significant hold was possibly that one. The third seed caught a break and went up 4-2 a few games later. It was never going to be easy to defeat the third seeds after they were up a break in the decider. When Ram was serving for the match, Ebden and Bopanna applied pressure, but the experienced campaigner of Indian ancestry remained composed under duress to win the match and make history.
