Australian Open 2024 tennis: Rohan Bopanna pulls out of mixed doubles

India’s Rohan Bopanna and his Hungarian partner Timea Babos pulled out of the Australian Open 2024 mixed doubles event on Saturday.

Bopanna and Babos, who reached the Australian Open final in 2018, were slated to take on Argentina’s Maximo Gonzalez and Ukraine’s Nadiia Kichenok in the first round at Melbourne Park on Saturday but withdrew at the eleventh hour.

Bopanna was the only Indian tennis player in the Australian Open 2024 mixed doubles draw. He made the Australian Open mixed doubles final with Sania Mirza last year.

It is, however, not known why Bopanna pulled out of the mixed doubles event.

“Going ahead this year, I’m not sure if I’m really going to commit to play mixed doubles,” Bopanna had told the Scroll website earlier this month. “Men’s doubles is the priority.’

The 43-year-old Bopanna and Australia’s Matthew Ebden, second seeds in men’s doubles, are in the third round of the Australian Open and will be in action against Netherlands’s Wesley Koolhof and Croatia’s Nikola Mektic on Sunday.

Bopanna remains the only Indian challenge alive at the Australian Open 2024.

Earlier on Saturday, India’s N Sriram Balaji and his Romanian partner Victor Vlad Cornea lost to Marcelo Arevalo of El Salvador and Mate Pavic of Croatia, the 10th seeds, by a 6-3, 6-3 scoreline in the second round of men’s doubles.

Arevalo and Pavic broke Balaji’s serves in the third game to take the lead and got the better of Cornea’s serves in the ninth game to win the first set. Arevalo and Pavic found the break in the sixth game of the second set off Balaji to make the third round.

The Australian Open 2024 was N Sriram Balaji’s debut Grand Slam event. Along with Cornea, Balaji won the first round against Italian pair Matteo Arnaldi and Andrea Pellegrino in straight sets.