Nikola Mektic and Mate Pavic started their Green Group campaign at the Nitto ATP Finals with a their 60th match win of the season on Sunday.
The Croatians, who have already finished at year-end No. 1 in the FedEx ATP Doubles Team Rankings, defeated eighth seeds Kevin Krawietz and Horia Tecau 6-4, 6-4 in 77 minutes at the Pala Alpitour.
In an outstanding season, 34-year-old Mektic and 28-year-old Pavic have captured ninth tour-level trophies, including at Wimbledon (d. Granollers/Zeballos), the Tokyo Olympics gold medal (d. Cilic/Dodig) and three ATP Masters 1000s: the Miami Open presented by Itau and Rolex Monte-Carlo Masters (d. Evans/N. Skupski both times), and the Internazionali BNL d’Italia in Rome (d. Ram/Salisbury).
Following their win on Sunday, Mektic and Pavic were presented the year-end No. 1 doubles trophy by ATP Chairman Andrea Gaudenzi in an on-court ceremony.
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Tecau came under pressure immediately, losing his serve when he missed a half volley at the net in the first game, but the Romanian recovered from 15/40 with four straight points at 1-3. Pavic calmly closed out the 35-minute opener with a hold to love in a serve-dominated performance, with the Croatians striking four aces and winning 90 per cent of their first-service points overall.
The second set turned in favour of Mektic and Pavic when Krawietz hit a second double fault on the deciding point at 2-2. It proved to be decisive, as Mektic later closed out the match with an ace.
Krawietz and Tecau are now 28-14 on the season. Six years ago, Tecau did not drop a set en route to 2015 Nitto ATP Finals trophy with Jean-Julien Rojer to the season as the World No. 1 team.
Fourth seeds Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos, and sixth seeds Ivan Dodig and Filip Polasek also feature in the Green Group at the Pala Alpitour in Turin.