Doubles Needs More Attention – Even Doubles Qualifying In Washington, D.C.

by Chloe Wellington-Hunt

As an ATP 500 level tournament. the Mubadala DC Open features a doubles qualifying event. In the most intriguing final-round qualifying match, 37-year-old Brazilian Fernando Romboli and Australian John-Patrick Smith, also age 37, battled their way into the main draw, defeating Americans Jordan Lee and Stefan Kozlov 6-4, 1-6, 10-7. Romboli and Smith will play the French team Sadio Doumbia and Fabien Reboul on Tuesday, July 28.

Lee, at only 16 years old, is the youngest player in the tournament and is weeks removed from winning the Wimbledon boys’ title over Cruz Hewitt, Lleyton Hewitt’s son, in a neck-and-neck three-set match. Kozlovm aksi from the USA, has over a decade on Lee – he turned pro in 2013, reaching a career-high singles ranking of 103 in 2022 and a career-high doubles ranking of 180 in 2017.L

Lee and Kozlov didn’t make it easy–Romboli and Smith powered through a close first set, relying on their firepower and clever maneuvering off second-serve points. Kozlov and Lee ultimately dominated on serves throughout the first two sets, winning 90% of their first serve points.

The second set brought a huge momentum shift. After talking to Romboli after their win, he didn’t appear worried by their performance shift in the second set at all. As he expressed, it was a few points that went the wrong way, and they brought it back in the tiebreak.

“I don’t think it’s something huge,” he said about their 1-6 loss in the second set. “We got two breaks on deuce points…one of the breaks we had like 40-love up, and they got into it and played well, and we just couldn’t finish a couple points that we had our hands on.”

As Romboli told us, the highs and lows are built into the doubles game.

“Doubles is like this,” Romboli said. “It’s very fast. It’s quick. If you’re not sharp and don’t finish points, you can end up losing 1-6, like you saw.”

With Lee and Kozlov’s fan section in full force, the Americans created new opportunities on the court and secured that set easily, ultimately forcing a nail-biter match tiebreak. But the Brazilian and Australian didn’t tire out.

During the tiebreak, Romboli and Smith stayed strong, even as the American crowd started to chant loudly. “We just tried to focus on ourselves,” Romboli said. “Every time we have a crowd against us we try to do that…we try to keep it between us. It’s tough if you start to pay attention to the outside and feel the energy of course, the whole energy is against you.”

And Romboli and Smith did just that. Even as the Americans started to creep back into the tiebreak, the Brazilian-Australian duo remained strong. Using Smith’s lefty tactics and Romboli’s finishing, they remained steady in a tough tiebreak that could have easily gone either way. While a news report announced last November that the team was splitting up, as of this July, Smith and Romboli look strong and confident on the court together, especially during the tiebreak. As Romboli said, they were able to zoom in on themselves and drown out the noise.

“So you have to try to, you know, kind of forget about it, like just focus inside, so we tried that, and it worked,” Romboli said. “Really happy to go through [to the main draw].”

Ultimately, the pair pulled out the match tiebreak 10-7. While the last shot of the match hit by the Americans was barely, barely out, causing the American fans to erupt, Romboli spoke positively about Washington’s fans.

“[Washington] is nice, it’s my second time playing here,” Romboli said. “I like the conditions actually. The crowd is always nice. I know they were against us, but they were very polite.”

Neither Romboli nor Smith had a traditional trajectory into doubles. Unlike other doubles specialists, Romboli battled through both singles and doubles early in his career, reaching a career-high singles ranking of No. 236 in 2011. After turning pro in 2006, Romboli won his first ATP doubles title in 2021.

Romboli exists in a long line of exceptional Brazilian doubles players–Brazilian Marcelo Melo is arguably, one of the best doubles specialists in history. Melo is the only Brazilian to have reached World No. 1 in the ATP doubles rankings, which he achieved in 2015. Fellow Brazilians Rafael Matos and Orlando Luz have teamed up this year, doing very well on the doubles circuit, as they just finished as finalists at the Millenium Estoril Open.

The lefty Smith, on the other hand, took the American college tennis route. The Australian played tennis at the University of Tennessee, graduating in 2011, when he became the second player in the history of college tennis to be named a four-time All American in both singles and doubles. Turning pro immediately after graduating, Smith’s career-high in singles came in 2015, when he reached No. 108 in the world.

The pair officially teamed up in 2025, finding chemistry quickly and winning the 2025 U.S. Men’s Clay Court Championships in Houston, Texas last April. During the 2025 season, both players achieved career milestones with other partners –Romboli made it to his biggest final at the 2025 Hamburg Open with the acclaimed Argentinian doubles player: Andrés Molteni. At a career doubles high, Romboli hopes for a good run in Washington.

“It’s a great tournament,” Romboli said. “I like the conditions, and I’m so happy to be here.”