Qureshi, Mergea clinch maiden team title in Barcelona

KARACHI: Aisam ul Haq Qureshi of Pakistan and Florin Mergea of Romania won their first ATP World Tour doubles title as a team on Sunday by winning the final of Barcelona Open.

Pak-Romanian pair of Aisam and Mergea outclassed the German-Austrian duo of Philipp Petzschner and Alexander Peya 6-4, 6-3 in a rare final between unseeded pairings.

Qureshi/Mergea saved all nine break points faced and converted half of their break opportunities against Petzschner/Peya.

Aisam and Florin looked good throughout the tournament, they dropped only one set in this tournament, in the semi-finals while defeating Jean-Julien Rojer and Horia Tecau 6-3, 5-7, 14-12. The Pakistan/Romania pair had earlier knocked out top seeds pair of Henri Kontinen and John Peers in the round of eight.

The 37 year old Pakistani tennis star recently paired up with Romanian player and Barcelona was only fourth tournament for them together.

Mergea improves to 7-8 in doubles finals; Qureshi to 13-16. They will receive 500 ATP Doubles Rankings points and split €150,780 in prize money.

This was second double’s title for Aisam ul Haq in the year 2017 after earlier winning Auckland tournament pairing with Marcin Matkowski. The win at Barcelona is also 13th of Aisam’s career.

Talking to geo.tv after the remarkable win, Aisam said that he was happy to be back on winning wining track after struggling last year.

“I am very very happy to achieve this, I was struggling previously but I had self-belief in me and it paid me,” Aisam said.

“I have gelled well together with new partner and looking forward to upcoming tournaments in Madrid and Rome,” said Aisam who has also improved his ATP doubles’ ranking after the win.