Felix Auger-Aliassime, Denis Shapovalov team up to play Barcelona doubles
Rising Canadian stars Felix Auger-Aliassime and Denis Shapovalov will play doubles together at the Barcelona Open.
Auger-Aliassime, 18, and 19-year-old Shapovalov have no previous appearances as a team on the clay of Barcelona.
The Canadians are set to play doubles together at an ATP tournament for the third time in their careers.
Auger-Aliassime and Shapovalov debuted as a doubles team at the ATP level in 2016 when they were granted a wildcard into the Toronto Masters.
Back then, the Canadians suffered a first-round loss to Australian Bernard Tomic and Serb Viktor Troicki.
Auger-Aliassime and Shapovalov teamed up at the Toronto event last year but again failed to make it past their opening match after being handed a tough draw.
The Canadians suffered a straight-set defeat at the hands of South-African Kevin Anderson and Serbia's Novak Djokovic.
Auger-Aliassime and Shapovalov have also played doubles together three times at the Challenger level and twice at the Futures level.
Auger-Aliassime and Shapovalov last played together this past February when they represented Canada in the doubles rubber of the Canada and Slovakia Davis Cup qualifying round tie.
The Canadians lost to Martin Klizan and Filip Polasek but Canada still got the win and progressed to the Davis Cup Finals event.
The Barcelona Open doubles player field is also set to feature 2017 Wimbledon champions Marcelo Melo and Lukasz Kubot, 2016 Australian Open and US Open champions Jamie Murray and Bruno Soares, as well as 2017 Australian Open champions Henri Kontinen and John Peers.
The Barcelona event is set to be held from April 22-28.
from Tennis World USA http://bit.ly/2Ir4jlZ
No comments