Australian Open 2021: Barbora Krejcikova, Rajeev Ram win second blended doubles title in 3 years

Image Source : AP Barbora Krajcikova and Rajeev Ram
Barbora Krejcikova and Rajeev Ram have made the proper odd-year pairing on the Australian Open, including the 2021 blended doubles title to the one they shared in 2019.

For Krejcikova, it is three in a row. She and Ram had been in management from the beginning in a 6-1, 6-4 win Saturday over Australian wild playing cards Matt Ebden and Sam Stosur.

“It’s an amazing feeling,” Krejcikova mentioned. “I’m so grateful that we were able to get back together.”

Krejcikova gained her first Australian title with Ram two years in the past and with Croatia’s Nikola Mektic final yr.

“We had a year off as a team, but she didn’t have a year off — she won this thing last year, so that’s three years running for her,” Ram mentioned. “Amazing job. Pleasure to play together with her, all the time.”

It was a virus — not associated to COVID-19 — that quickly broke up the profitable partnership a month previous to the 2020 Australian Open.

“I was sick here in December that year and I didn’t think it was a good idea to try to play mixed doubles as well,” mentioned Ram, who gained the boys’s doubles title final yr with Joe Salisbury.

That places him in competition for a doubles double at Melbourne Park. The 36-year-old American and Salisbury can be making an attempt to defend the title within the doubles closing Sunday in opposition to Croatia’s Ivan Dodig and Slovakia’s Filip Polasek.

Krejcikova missed her likelihood at a double when she and fellow Czech Katerina Siniakova misplaced the ladies’s doubles closing on Friday to second-seeded Elise Mertens and Aryna Sabalenka.

She mentioned she put that out of her thoughts as quickly as attainable, aiming for an additional title.

Krejcikova and Ram confronted solely a single break level and wanted lower than an hour to beat Ebden and Stosur, who had been every earlier winners of the title however with totally different companions.

When Ebden held serve to lastly get the Australian pair on the scoreboard within the fifth sport, it was nonetheless a great distance again into the opening set. It proved an excessive amount of, with Krejcikova and Ram wrapping it up in simply 22 minutes.

Fans, who had stayed after Naomi Osaka’s win over Jennifer Brady within the ladies’s singles closing hoping to witness a house Slam triumph, vocally tried to elevate Ebden and Stosur. But it was to no avail.

The Australian pair lower down their errors within the second set and appeared to be getting again into the match however when Ram held serve simply within the ninth sport, it put the stress instantly again on Ebden’s serve.

Another couple of errors left Ebden and Stosur observing a match level. And when Ebden pulled a forehand huge after an extended baseline change, it was throughout in simply 59 minutes.

Krejcikova mentioned the partnership with Ram works due to their method to the sport. “I just feel we understand each other on and off the court,” she said. “He’s just really easygoing and it works out.”