Hingis in first Wimbledon final since 1998

She has never won the mixed doubles title at Wimbledon.

Though the World No. 1 Indian has three mixed doubles Grand Slam titles, she is yet to win the top prize in women’s doubles. Sania has reached the final of a women’s doubles Grand Slam final only second time in her career, having ended runners-up at the 2011 French Open with Russian partner Elena Vesnina.

It was also curtains for India’s Rohan Bopanna’s whose bid to enter his maiden Wimbledon doubles final came to a disappointing end as he along with his Romanian partner Florin Mergea lost a marathon five-setter against fourth seeded Dutch-Romanian pair of Jean Julien-Rojer and Horia Tecau.

Hingis, who is now 34, has won the women’s doubles at Wimbledon twice before, firstly in 1996 and then again in 1998. Sania and Martina got two chances to break Raquel and Abigail and utilised both perfectly to clinch the set and match. They were so clinical that they did not even give a breakpoint opportunity to their opponents.

The final set turned out to be a battle of patience, with both pairs holding serve for 23 games.

Paes is a victor of eighth men’s doubles Grand Slam titles and seven mixed doubles. Nagal and Ly will next take on Serbian-Norwegian pair of Miomir Kecmanovic and Casper Ruud for a place in the final.

Russia’s Elena Vesnina and Ekaterina Makarova will be the opponents for Hingis and Mirza after the second seeds beat Timea Babos and Kristina Mladenovic 6-3, 4-6, 6-4.

Later in the first round of girls’ doubles, Colombian-Indonesian pair of Maria Fernanda Herazo Gonzalez and Deria Nur Haliza defeated Indo-Japanese combine of Pranjala Yadlapalli and Chihiro Muramatsu 6-3, 6-2 in just over an hour on Court 14.