Huey, pal succumb in French Open 3rd round

MANILA, Philippines - Frenchmen Michael Llodra and Nicolas Mahut stopped Fil-Am Treat Conrad Huey and British Dominic Inglot on their tracks, fashioning out a 6-3, 6-4 victory in the 2013 French Open men’s doubles third round hostilities last Monday at Roland Garros.

Llodra and Mahut pounced on the poor reception of Huey and Inglot (11 of 50 receiving points won or 22 percent) to score the straight-set victory that shut the door on the Pinoy Davis Cupper and his partner.

The French pair will meet second-seeded Spaniards Marcel Granollers and Marc Lopez, in the quarterfinals. Granollers and Lopez advanced via a 6-3, 6-4 triumph over Colombians Juan Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah.

Despite the exit, Pinoy Davis Cupper Huey and Inglot still matched their career-best performance in the Grand Slams. The duo also reached the Last-16 in the clay courts of Paris last year.

Riding high on the finals stint in the previous week’s Swiss Indoors and Dusseldorf netfests, Huey and Inglot started their French Open campaign with a 7-6(5), 6-4 victory over German duo Tobias Kamke and Florian Mayer. They followed this up with a  6-3, 7-6 (5) disposal of Russian Mikhail Elgin and Uzbek Denis Istomin to keep their French Open bids kicking.

Huey, who carries a rank of 25th in doubles play, also competed in the mixed doubles at Roland Garros but he and American partner Raquel Kops-Jones failed to get past the first round, losing to  Austrian Julian Knowle and Chinese Shuai Zhang, 1-6, 2-6.