Oliver Marach has reached the quarter-finals of the ATP Masters in Miami with his double partner Mate Pavic. In round two, the reigning Australian Open champions beat brothers Alexander and Mischa Zverev 7-6(5), 6-4.
Favourite Marach/Pavic had an early break to 3-1, but missed out on the set. With a double error by Pavic at 5:4, the double specialists relinquished their lead.
It went into a tiebreak, in which both Marach and Sascha Zverev showed once worth seeing at the net with fast reflexes. Pavic served twice as hard at 3-4 before Marach had a service winner follow a return winner at the sixth set ball.
In the second round Mischa Zverev had to serve in the first game over the deciding point. The Zverev brothers recovered from this setback as well as from a 2-3 loss, but Marach/Pavic took the serve off the Germans again at 4-4 and finally closed the bag after one hour and 28 minutes.
Marach/Pavic reach for their third tournament victory of the current season in Miami. They won the Doha and Auckland tournaments in January before securing their first Grand Slam victory in Melbourne. In the quarter-finals, the Russian pairing Karen Khachanov/Andrey Rublev is now waiting.
Marach/Pavic is not the only Austrian-Croatian pairing in action on Sunday in the Crandon Park of key Biscane. Alexander Peya will also play for the quarter-finals with Nikola Mektic, but will be a slight underdog against number two seeded Henri Kontinen/Jonathan Peers.
However, Peya and Philipp Petzschner beat them both last week at the Challenger tournament in Irving, where they finally secured the title. Peya/Mektic beat Novak Djokovic and Viktor Troicki in the first round of Miami.