Granollers/Zeballos Oust Two-Time Defending Champs Mektic/Pavic

Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos held their nerve for a thrilling first-round upset on Sunday at the Internazionali BNL d’Italia.

The Spanish-Argentine pairing snapped the 10-match winning streak in Rome of fifth seeds and Nikola Mektic and Mate Pavic with a 7-6(6), 3-6, 10-8 victory at the clay-court ATP Masters 1000.

Granollers and Zeballos appeared to have lost their momentum when they lost five straight points to let a 6/2 lead slip in the Match Tie-break, but they held firm for a one-hour, 46-minute win against the 2021 and 2022 champions.

There were no such problems for top seeds Wesley Koolhof and Neal Skupski or second seeds Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury. Koolhof and Skupski defeated Matwe Middelkoop and Andreas Mies 6-7(3), 6-3, 10-4 while Ram and Salisbury beat Maximo Gonzalez and Andres Molteni 6-3, 6-2.