Huey, Mirnyi advance to second round of French Open

FILE — Max Mirnyi of Belarus Treat Huey of Philippines. Matthew Stockman/Getty Images/AFP

Treat Huey and partner Max Mirnyi of Belarus fought off a match point to turn back their fancied opponents and make the second round of the French Open men’s doubles.

Huey and Mirnyi overcame a match point late in the second set and forced a tie break en route to a thrilling 6-7 (7-3), 7-6 (7-5), 6-1 decision over Italians Fabio Fognini and Andreas Seppi at Court 15.

“It was great fight and win today. We came out in the second set after losing the first set and had a lot of energy,” Huey told this reporter via Twitter direct message.

“We fought off a match point at the end of the second set and played a great breaker to win the second set. From there we had a lot of momentum and played great in the third to win at 6-1,” he added.

They will next face Ricardas Berankis of Lithuania and Lukas Rosol of Czech Republic who beat Marcelo Demoliner of Brazil and Marin Draganja of Croatia 6-7 (7-3), 7-6 (11-9), 6-4.

Huey and Mirnyi scored six aces through the match and converted four of 12 breakpoint opportunities. They also saved eight of 10 break points they faced.

Huey and Mirnyi are looking to at least duplicate their quarterfinal stint in this year’s Australian Open.

The 30-year-old Virginia-born Filipino is hoping to leapfrog his way to the world ranking to make the Rio Olympics. He is currently at 24th place and needs to be at least at 10th to make it outright.