{"id":13765,"date":"2019-01-25T11:11:02","date_gmt":"2019-01-25T03:11:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/?p=13765"},"modified":"2019-01-25T11:11:02","modified_gmt":"2019-01-25T03:11:02","slug":"double-act-for-west-aussies-in-ao-finals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/news\/2019\/01\/25\/double-act-for-west-aussies-in-ao-finals","title":{"rendered":"Double Act for West Aussies in AO Finals"},"content":{"rendered":"

WA tennis has a lot to be proud of, with rising tennis star Astra Sharma <\/strong>last night surging her way through to the Mixed Doubles Final at the Australian Open, with partner John-Patrick Smith<\/strong>. Sharma joins fellow West Australian, John Peers<\/strong> in the hunt for a Grand Slam title, as he competes in the Men\u2019s Double\u2019s Final this weekend with partner Henri Kontinen.<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sharma\u2019s win completes an Aussie doubles trifecta with Samantha Stosur<\/strong> also winning her way through to the Women\u2019s Doubles Final.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sharma and Smith appeared un-phased by the limelight of playing on Rod Laver Arena last night, winning in straight sets against the second-seeded pairing of American Nicole Melichar<\/strong> and Brazilian Bruno Soares \u00a0<\/strong>6-4 7-6(5) to reach their first major decider.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

On Thursday night, Smith had even more reason to celebrate, triumphing on his 30th birthday.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sharma, a 23-year-old Western Australian, with affiliations to Bull Creek Tennis Club and Kardinya Tennis Club, \u00a0\u00a0and Smith, a veteran from Townsville, had limited knowledge of each other before pairing together this fortnight.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

They\u2019ve clearly struck it off, defeating multiple-major winners Bethanie Mattek-Sands<\/strong> and Jamie Murray<\/strong> in the quarterfinal before Thursday night\u2019s triumph.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cJust speechless really. Can\u2019t really believe the situation we\u2019re in. Just to keep beating such high-quality opponents, I mean, coming into this I had zero expectations and now I\u2019m just absolutely over the moon,\u201d Sharma said.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As Smith acknowledged, Sharma was the star, continuing her fine form in singles at Melbourne Park.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sharma, the world No.232, qualified for her first major tournament and won her first-round match to ensure a huge rankings drop.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cObviously it\u2019s been so much fun, these two weeks here. Very thankful for the opportunity,\u201d Smith said. \u201cAnd playing with Astra \u2013 it\u2019s her first Slam, so she\u2019s doing fantastic. And I\u2019m just glad I got the opportunity to play with her.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cI think Astra\u2019s fearless out there; she goes for her shots, goes for her serve, not afraid to take over the net and it\u2019s just pretty easy out there when someone plays with so much confidence.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sharma can toast a first taste of Grand Slam tennis with a final against Czech Barbora Krejcikova <\/strong>and American Rajeev Ram<\/strong> on Saturday, the country\u2019s national day.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The following day prior to the Men\u2019s Singles Final, fellow WA compatriot, John Peers will team up with Finn, Henri Kontinen in a bid to win their second Australian Open men\u2019s doubles title.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The No.12 seeds downed Argentina\u2019s Leonardo Mayer <\/strong>and Portugal\u2019s Joao Sousa<\/strong> 6-1 7-6(6) in the opening semifinal at Melbourne Park on Thursday.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It has been a remarkable turnaround in form for the duo, who after winning their first round match at the US Open went on to lose their last five straight matches of the 2018 season.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In that time, Peers\u2019 ranking slumped from No.7 to No.23, and he entered the Australian Open at 28th.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s always great to do well at your home Slam and put in a good performance, especially after the way we finished off last year,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cIt was really nice to start the year off the right way and get some wins under the belt right away at the first Grand Slam of the year.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201c(Late last year) we were actually very close nearly every match. (So we thought) let\u2019s just stick with it an execute a couple more times and things will start rolling our way, and that\u2019s what\u2019s started to happen, which has been nice.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cGot some confidence and got things rolling.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Peers and Kontinen will play Frenchmen Pierre-Hugues Herbert <\/strong>and Nicolas Mahut,<\/strong> who beat Americans Ryan Harrison <\/strong>and Sam Querrey <\/strong>in the other semifinal.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s gonna be a tough match; we know those guys,\u201d Peers said of the French duo.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cI think they\u2019re going for the career slam as well. And so we know it\u2019s going to be a really tough match. They\u2019re going to play big and can win matches on their own terms.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be about us seeing what we can do and focus on our level and bring what we can on that day and see if it\u2019s good enough.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s always great to play in front of the home crowd and get the support.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Peers won his first Grand Slam doubles title at Australian Open 2017 alongside Kontinen. He has called WA home for the last few years, and has represented Mosman Park Tennis Club in the WA State League Competition.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

-ends-<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Mixed Doubles Event will be played on Saturday 26 January, immediately following the Women\u2019s Singles Final.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Men\u2019s Doubles will be played on Sunday 27 January, from 3pm, prior to the Men\u2019s Doubles Final. <\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

For more information, including, draws, schedules and live scoring, visit: ausopen.com<\/a> <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WA tennis has a lot to be proud of, with rising tennis star Astra Sharma last night surging her way through to the Mixed Doubles Final at the Australian Open, with partner John-Patrick Smith. Sharma joins fellow West Australian, John Peers in the hunt for a Grand Slam title, as he competes in the Men\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5812,"featured_media":13766,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13765","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13765","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5812"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13765"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13765\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}