Athlete of the Week on RRI – Tennis player Florin Mergea
This weekend the Madrid Masters Tournament, owned by former tennis legend Ion Tiriac, came to an end. Florin Mergea of Romania and Rohan Bopanna of India won the mens doubles.
Newsroom, 12.05.2015, 13:34
This weekend the Madrid Masters Tournament, owned by former tennis legend Ion Tiriac, came to an end. Florin Mergea of Romania and Rohan Bopanna of India won the mens doubles. For his remarkable achievement, we have designated Florin Mergea Athlete of the Week on RRI.
In the first round, Mergea and Bopanna knocked out Marin Draganja of Croatia and Henri Kontinen of Finland, 5-7, 7-6, 10-6. In the round of 16, they defeated eighth-seeds Nicolas Mahut and Edouard Roger-Vasselin of France, 6-4, 4-6, 10-5. In the quarterfinals, the two took on Juan Sebstian Cabal of Columbia and Adrian Mannarino of France, which they outperformed, 6-3, 6-2. The semifinals pitted Mergea and Bopanna against sixth-seeds Marcel Granollers and Marc Lopez of Spain. It was a close win, final score 6-7, 6-3, 11-9. In Sundays final game, Mergea and Bopanna played fifth-seeds Marcin Matkowski of Poland and Nenad Zimonjic of Serbia. They won the match 6-2, 6-7, 11-9. For their win, Mergea and Bopanna were awarded 1,000 ATP points and a 250,000-dollar check.
Ranked 14th in ATP doubles standings, Florin Mergea managed the greatest performance in his career. Mergea has another three ATP trophies on his track record: one in 2013 in Vienna alongside Lukas Rosol of the Czech Republic and two last year, in Vina del Mar with Olver Marach of Austria and in Hamburg with Marin Draganja of Croatia.
Let us note that Florin Mergea was born on January 26, 1985 in Craiova, into a family of physicians. As a young player, Mergea paired up with Horia Tecau. The two had a good run together, winning several top-level competitions, including the under-21 mens doubles in Wimbledon. Over the last three years, Florin Mergea had a surprising ascension, given that hes arguably no longer in his prime. In September 2012 he made it into the worlds top 100 players in doubles standings. At present he is ranked 15th.
