Italy’s Tennis Stars Fognini-Bolelli win doubles title and American women finish strong in Melbourne

Written by: Staff on 31st January 2015

Italy's Tennis Stars Fognini-Bolelli win doubles title and American women finish strong in Melbourne |

By Ricky Dimon
It’s only January, but London can go ahead and starting getting ready for Fabio Fognini. That’s right; the volatile Italian is likely heading to the World Tour Finals.

The all-Italian pairing of Fognini and Simone Bolelli captured the Australian Open men’s doubles title on Saturday night, defeating the French duo of Nicolas Mahut and Pierre-Hugues Herbert 6-4, 6-4.

“I think we did something amazing,” Bolelli reflected. “Maybe we didn’t realize what we made today, but maybe tomorrow we’re going to realize better. Now I think we’re thinking about the ATP Finals is one of our goals.”

“Even if it’s doubles and you say, okay, our priority, it’s singles, but we have to recognize we won a Grand Slam. It’s not like you can win every day or every year, so at the moment we are really happy. Simone says that the goal now is going to be the ATP Finals in London. We have to recognize we have a chance.”

The only they would be knocked out, in fact, would be if another doubles team wins a Grand Slam later this season and finishes outside the top eight in the rankings but ahead of Bolelli and Fognini. Although rare, the same scenario actually just happened in 2014, when Wimbledon doubles champions Vasek Pospisil and Jack Sock were edged out for a London spot by Australian Open winners Lukasz Kubot and Robert Lindstedt.

On the women’s side, two Americans are bringing home trophies. Not only did Serena Williams take care of business and win her 19th Grand Slam singles title, but Bethanie Mattek-Sands also triumphed in doubles., a first-time partnership, beat Yung-Jan Chan and Jie Zheng 6-4, 7-6(5) in Friday’s final.

“I don’t know how often it’s happened that a first-time pairing has won,” Mattek-Sands commented. “But I think a big part of it is me and Lucie are really good friends. Communication’s huge. Whether we were down in a match, up in a match, we were having fun. I think that helps teams really play well.”

Ricky contributes to 10sballs.com and also maintains his own tennis website, The Grandstand.

Topics: American Tennis, Australian Open, BETHANIE Mattek-Sands, Fabio Fognini, Lucie Safarova, Serena Williams, Simone Bolelli, Tennis, Tennis News