Jamie Murray and his doubles partner Bruno Soares missed out on a first title of 2018 after losing in the final of the Qatar Open.

The top-seeded pair were beaten 2-6 6-7 (6-8) by second seeds Oliver Marach of Austria and Mate Vavic of Croatia.

Murray and Soares battled to find fluency in the opening set with the Brazilian struggling on his serve.

The pair tried to rally in the second set but their opponents proved too strong in the tie-break.

In the men’s singles, French wildcard Gael Monfils advanced to the final after the top seed Dominic Thiem from Austria, withdrew ahead of their semi-final with a fever.

He will face either Guido Pella of Argentina or Russian Andrey Rublev in Saturday’s decider.

Meanwhile, defending champion Katerina Siniakova beat former world number one Maria Sharapova to reach the final of the WTA Shenzhen Open in China.

The Czech player sent down 27 winners and 10 aces to triumph 6-2 3-6 6-3 and set up a meeting with world number one Simona Halep.

The Romanian top seed beat her compatriot Irina-Camelia Begu 6-1 6-4.