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Portuguese tennis player Francisco Cabral secured a spot in the doubles semifinals of the ATP 250 Stuttgart tournament in Germany on Thursday, partnering with Croatia's Nikola Mektic. The duo defeated the German pair of Daniel Altmaier and Hendrik Trhac in straight sets.
Cabral, currently ranked 22nd in the world for doubles, and Mektic, ranked 18th and a former world number one in the discipline, overcame their German opponents 6-3, 7-6 (7-4) in a match lasting one hour and 10 minutes.
The Portuguese-Croatian tandem, competing together for the first time, now awaits their semifinal opponents. They will face the winners of the match between Estonia's Daniil Glinka and Greece's Stefanos Sakellaridis, and a yet-to-be-determined pair from the first round.
After a less-than-successful partnership with Britain's Joe Salisbury, which yielded only two wins in eight matches and an early exit in the first round of Roland Garros, Francisco Cabral appears to have rediscovered his winning form.
This marks Cabral's first semifinal appearance since January, when he reached that stage in Auckland. Despite this temporary partnership with Mektic in Stuttgart, Cabral will reunite with Austrian Lucas Miedler for the remainder of the grass-court season, which culminates with Wimbledon, the year's third Grand Slam.
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