Rohan Bopanna and Timea Barbosa lose in Australian Open mixed doubles finals

Rohan Bopanna and Barbosa lost 6-2 4-6 9-11 to the Croat-Canadian pair of Pavic and Dabrowski, seeded eighth, in a match which lasted for one hour and eight minutes.

The fifth seeds dominated the opening set, helped to a great extent, by their erratic opponents, who conceded seven break points and they managed to convert two of those chances to take the early advantage.

However, Pavic and Dabrowski roared back into the match in the second set. Their serve was flawless as the pair did not concede a single breakpoint.

The Croatian/Canadian pair looked likely to stay on top heading into the match tiebreak and that was borne out; they won the first three points as their opposition’s intensity continued to wane. But it was Bopanna who came out with some exquisite shots, that saw the match to hang on a knife edge as the scoreboard read 6-6 in the tiebreaker. 

In a rollercoaster of emotions, it was anybody’s title until Bopanna threaded a forehand past Dabrowski at the net to bring up a match point. But Pavic stood to the task as he belted down two consecutive aces to bring up a match point of their own. 

Gabriela Dabrowski finally ended the match with a beautifully-timed forehand return which saw the 8 seeds as a victorious pair.

Interestingly, Bopanna had won his maiden Grand Slam crown at the 2017 French Open with Dabrowski.