Klaasen stumbles, but pair still alive
RAVEN Klaasen and Rajeev Ram were brought back down to earth with a bump as they were comfortably beaten by Henri Kontinen and John Peers in their ATP World Tour Finals encounter at the O2 Arena in London yesterday afternoon.
King William’s Town-born Klaasen and his American playing partner Ram were in top form having beaten the world number one doubles team Pierre-Hugues Herbert and Nicolas Mahut, both of France, in their opening tour finals encounter on Monday, but followed it up by slumping 6-3, 6-4 to the tournament fifth seeds yesterday.
“Kontinen and Peers are the in-form team on the tour at the moment and their aggressive attacking game complemented by strong serving and solid volleys makes them a real tough team to beat,” Klaasen and Ram's touring coach Jeff Coetzee said.
“My boys never gave themselves a chance to get into the match by being broken early in the opening set and first game of the second set, Kontinen and Peers are very good frontrunners.”
The result means that Klaasen and Ram will have to win their final world tour match against Spanish fourth seeds Marc Lopez and Feliciano Lopez if they are to have any chance of making the semifinals.
Herbert and Mahut were set to play the Lopez duo last night with the losers being knocked out and the winners having to probably challenge Klaasen and Ram for the final semi spot.
In the match Finland’s Kontinen and Australian Peers were in no mood to mess about as they broke Klaasen and Ram once in each set, while barely breaking a sweat.
It was a quick start as both teams held their first service games before Kontinen and Peers broke for a 3-1 lead in the first set and immediately consolidated it with a solid hold for 4-1.
Klaasen and Ram forced a sniff in the seventh game with a breakpoint, but Kontinen and Peers closed it out to move 5-2 up.
The next two service games were pretty straight forward allowing the Kontinen and Peers to take the opening set.
A disastrous start to the second set then saw Klaasen and Ram allowing Kontinen and Peers to move 2-0 after holding their serve.
A bit more fight was shown by Klaasen and Ram as they worked two more breakpoints during the set, but stoic defence from Kontinen and Peers ended any chance, while they also worked a number of breakpoints themselves that Klaasen and Ram had to defend.
In the end, Kontinen and Peers defended all three breakpoints they faced, while Klaasen and Ram defended seven of their nine, which ended up proving the difference.
It will now come down to tomorrow’s crunch tie to see if they can progress.
“Despite today’s loss, Raven and Rajeev are upbeat and will regroup and put in a solid practise on Thursday and be well-prepared to give themselves their best chance in Friday’s crunch match,” said Coetzee.