US Open Champions Melzer-Petzschner Confirmed For Kuala Lumpur

© Getty ImagesJurgen Melzer and Philipp Petzschner won the US Open earlier this month.

Austrian Jurgen Melzer and German Philipp Petzschner are the new US Open Doubles Champions and their first Asian tournament since being crowned in New York is the Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur 2011.

“We are really looking forward to being in Kuala Lumpur,” said Melzer after winning their inaugural US Open. “I have seen tennis increase in popularity in Asia over recent years and I am sure the fans in Kuala Lumpur will give us a great welcome, especially now with this new title which Philipp and I are very proud of.”

Melzer and Petzschner came to the forefront of the doubles game in 2010 when they became the surprise winners of Wimbledon. They have produced solid results ever since and by winning the US Open last week, they have solidified themselves as one of the premier doubles combinations in the world.

“We have often discussed the strength of the singles field for the Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur, but tennis fans will see that the doubles game is equally impressive and having the US Open Champions in our line-up, gives the tournament even more status,” Tournament Director Nick Freyer of organisers IMG said.

“The doubles game is always exciting and fast paced and our knowledgeable fans will get the opportunity to watch reigning Grand Slam Champions in action first hand.”

The US Open final was an overwhelming result for Melzer and Petzschner as they defeated the Polish combination of Mariusz Fyrstenberg and Marcin Matkowski who were champions in 2009 and finalists in 2010 at the Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur.

For Melzer and Petzschner, the US Open was their third title of 2011 and fifth overall together. Last year besides Wimbledon they also won in Zagreb and this year they were victorious in Stuttgart and Rotterdam. As a team they are now fifth in the world. The US Open has also seen them qualify for the year-end ATP World Tour Finals in London.

“I think it was a great win and we played incredible doubles today,” Petzschner said. “We are 5-0 in finals, it's great. Winning another slam it's an amazing feeling, and we're both really happy the way it went out.”

Melzer backed up his partner saying it was an amazing experience: “We have played from the word ‘go’. We were there and we have been playing really well. They were a little bit nervous in the beginning, and we fully, I think, used that to our advantage.  In the end it's a 2 and 2 victory, and we were happy about that.”

The doubles draw, like the singles has representatives from all over the world with 15 nations represented from Austria to the Dutch Antilles and from Brazil to the USA. Asia has three nations in the field, Malaysia, India and The Philippines.

The main draw doubles wild card went to Malaysia’s Si Yew Ming and American Ryan Harrison and among some of the other combinations are Somdev Devvarman and Treat Conrad Huey, Alex Bogomolov Jr. and Lukas Rosol and Grand Slam winner Lukas Dlouhy and Marcelo Melo.

And four players from the doubles draw are also in the singles draw, Devvarman, Rosol, Bogomolov Jr. and Dmitry Tursunov.

For more information and updates on the Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur 2011, please log on to www.MalaysianOpenTennis.com.

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