Pune, Jan 29 (IANS): Rohan Bopanna, who won the men's doubles title here with Divij Sharan in 2019, and his new partner Ramkumar Ramanathan will open their campaign in the 2022 Tata Open Maharashtra with a match against Jamie Cerretani and Nicholas Monroe of the United States in the opening round.

The draw for men's doubles was announced on Saturday for the ATP Tour 250 event that will be held from January 31 and February

The Indian duo is seeded second and will be favourite to win the title and was on Saturday drawn to meet Austria's Alexander Erley and the Czech Republic Jiri Vesely, the defending singles champion when the event was last held in 2020 before the Covid-19 pandemic break if they get the better of French pair Hugo Grenier and Quentin Halys in the first round.

Indian world cards, Yuki Bhambri and Divij Sharan who will open against Dennis Novak of Austria and Joao Sousa of Portugal; while another wild card entrants Arjun Khade and Purav Raja will start against Maldova's Radu Albot and Ricardas Berankis of Lithuania.

The Indian pairs will be hoping to keep up the Indian record of going into the later rounds.

Top seeds Luke Saville and John-Patrick Smith of Australia will open a campaign against Italy's Stefano Travaglia and Bernabe Zapata Miralles of Spain in the first round.

Fourth seeds Marc Polmans and Matt Reid of Australia will start against the Italy-Finland combination of Gianluca Mager and Emil Russuvori.