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Sania-Martina enter final; Bopanna's campaign over at Australian Open

Sports Wednesday 27/January/2016 18:50 PM
By: Times News Service
Sania-Martina enter final; Bopanna's campaign over at Australian Open

Melbourne: Indian tennis ace Sania Mirza and her Swiss partner Martina Hingis stormed into the final of the women's doubles event of the Australian Open after notching up a comfortable straight-set win here on Wednesday.
However, Rohan Bopanna's campaign ended with a shock defeat in the mixed doubles quarterfinals with partner Yung-Jan Chan of Chinese Taipei.
Sania and Martina, who are on a record winning streak, continued to rule the roost as they brushed aside Julia Goerges and Karolina Pliskova, the 13th seeds, 6-1, 6-0 in just 54 minutes at Rod Laver Arena to enter their third successive doubles Grand Slam final.
The top seeded Indo-Swiss pair will take on the seventh seeded Czech combination of Andrea Hlavackova and Lucie Hradecka in the summit clash.
Sania and Martina broke their rivals twice in the first set, which lasted 26 minutes, before steamrolling the German-Czech combo in the second set.
The Indo-Swiss duo won the Wimbledon and US Open titles, before winning the season ending WTA Finals in 2015.
They continued their superb form this year, extending their unbeaten run to 35 with Wednesday's semi-final win. They have also won back-to-back titles at the Brisbane and Sydney International events, before starting their Australian Open campaign.
Earlier, the third seed Bopanna and Chan lost 2-6, 5-7 to unseeded combination of Slovenia's Andreja Klepac and Philippines' Treat Huey in just 55 minutes at Show Court 2.
The Indo-Taipei team squandered four break chances in the match, including three in the second set, to bow out of the tournament.
Meanwhile, Indian challenge ended in the junior girls event with the defeat of Karman Kaur Thandi and Pranjala Yadlapalli in both singles and doubles.
In the singles, Karman lost 6-3, 5-7, 5-7 to Sara Tomic of Australia in the third round while 10th-seeded Pranjala bowed out after a 5-7, 5-7 defeat against 8th-seeded Russian Anastasia Potapova.
Later in the doubles, the fifth seeded duo of Karman and Pranjala lost 6-7(3), 5-7 to the Australian pair of Maddison Inglis and Jaimee Fourlis.