Cabal/Farah Cruise To Wimbledon QF Spot
Juan Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah enjoyed a comprehensive triumph on Sunday at Wimbledon to reach the quarter-finals at the grass-court major for the third consecutive time.
The Colombian sixth seeds, who lifted the trophy at SW19 in 2019, broke Radu Albot and Nikoloz Basilashvili four times to seal a 6-1, 6-4, 6-4 third-round victory. Cabal and Farah’s opponents in the London quarter-finals will be 13th seeds Santiago Gonzalez and Andres Molteni or all-American duo Denis Kudla and Jack Sock.
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Things weren’t so straightforward for Nikola Mektic and Mate Pavic. The second seeds did manage to keep their defence of their 2021 title alive, but not without a scare along the way.
The all-Croatian team regained its composure in a decisive fifth set to edge Lloyd Glasspool and Harri Heliovaara with a 6-4, 7-6(6), 4-6, 2-6, 6-3 third-round victory. Mektic and Pavic appeared to be cantering to the quarter-finals when they led Glasspool and Heliovaara by two-sets-to-love on Court 12, but an inspired comeback from the British-Finnish pairing turned a comfortable afternoon for the second seeds into a three-hour, 14-minute epic.
The 13-time tour-level titlists Mektic and Pavic, who are chasing their third consecutive crown on grass after triumphs at The Queen’s Club and Eastbourne, carved out 15 break point opportunities in the match but converted just three. Crucially, however, two of those came in the fifth set, when they broke their opponents’ serve in the fourth and eighth games to secure a spot in the quarter-finals.
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Top seeds Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury also had to dig deep after dropping the opening set to Mallorca Championships winners Rafael Matos and David Vega Hernandez.
Ram and Salisbury sit at No. 2 and No. 1 in the Pepperstone ATP Doubles Rankings, respectively, but the pair is yet to win a tour-level grass-court title. They moved one step closer to doing that at SW19 by rallying to a 4-6, 6-4, 6-3, 6-4 win against the 16th-seeded Matos and Vega Hernandez
Awaiting Ram and Salisbury in the quarter-finals will be Nicolas Mahut and Edouard Roger-Vasselin.