Del Potro/Thiem Beaten On Doubles Debut

Pablo Cuevas and Marcel Granollers were solid on serve on Monday to get the better of Juan Martin del Potro and Dominic Thiem 6-3, 7-6(8) in 87 minutes at the Mutua Madrid Open.

Cuevas and Granollers won the first three games of the match, then, towards the end of a competitive second set, won the first four points of the tie-break. Del Potro and Thiem recovered to lead 5/4 and, having saved one match point at 5/6, could not convert one set point of their own at 7/6 as del Potro returned a backhand long.

Cuevas sealed victory with an unreturned served for a place in the second round against top seeds and defending champions Lukas Kubot and Marcelo Melo.

In the other only doubles match on day two, Dutch pair Robin Haase and Jean-Julien Rojer knocked out Santiago Gonzalez and Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi 7-5, 6-3 in 74 minutes. They now face fifth seeds Jamie Murray and Bruno Soares.

Did You Know?
In the first 13 editions of the Mutua Madrid Open (2002-2014), only three winning doubles teams did not feature Daniel Nestor, Bob Bryan or Mike Bryan. Nestor won three of the first four championship matches in Madrid alongside Mark Knowles and also triumphed with Nenad Zimonjic in 2009 and 2014, while Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan won the event on five occasions between 2006 and 2013.