Marin Cilic: Making Tokyo doubles final pinnacle of mine and Ivan Dodig's career

Croatian tennis star Marin Cilic couldn't hide his happiness and excitement after and fellow compatriot Ivan Dodig made the doubles final at the Tokyo Olympics. 

Cilic and Dodig demolished Marcus Daniell and Michael Venus 6-2 6-2 to reach the doubles final at the Tokyo Olympics. 

“For me and Ivan, this is the pinnacle of our careers," Cilic admitted, per the ITF website. "We have won everything in tennis, from Futures level up to Grand Slams. We had difficult times coming up through youth tennis, both me and him coming from a small place of Medjugorje with a population of only 4000.

"We started tennis together, and to reach this last thing, to win a medal for our country, for ourselves together, is just unreal. We are incredibly proud of ourselves and we played an unbelievable tournament here – the best tournament we ever had together. We showed our strength and how good we are as a team.”

Cilic and Dodig set to meet fellow Croatians 

In the second semifinal, recent Wimbledon champions Nikola Mektic and Mate Pavic beat USA's Austin Krajicek and Tennys Sndgren 6-4 6-4. 

"It's a big deal for the whole of Croatia," said Pavic.

"It's such a small country. We had that tradition in doubles always in the last few years, but this is exceptional. We are super happy to be in the final.

"It's a historical day for Croatian tennis. We have a good tradition with doubles throughout the years, we won many bronze medals in doubles so we're keeping it up and nobody expected this at the beginning of the tournament.

"But we are here now, we're happy for [Cilic and Dodig]. They also played a great couple of matches and tomorrow it's gonna be a  big day for all of us. We're here to enjoy it."

Mektic and Pavic have won eight titles so far in 2021 and it won't be easy for Cilic and Dodig to beat them. 

from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/3lboqaY