Tennis: Michael Venus, Raven Klaasen beaten in Wimbledon doubles final

South Africa's Raven Klaasen, left, and New Zealand's Michael Venus touch hands during their men's doubles final match against Mike Bryan and Jack Sock. Photo / AP.

Michael Venus came within a set of claiming his second Grand Slam doubles title.

The Kiwi ace and South African playing partner Raven Klaasen fell agonisingly short of winning at Wimbledon, falling in five sets to American duo Jack Sock and Mike Bryan.

While he was unable to add to his 2017 French Open title, Venus told the Herald he and Klaasen's performance was a big confidence booster heading into the final part of the season.

"For the first half of the year we'd been solid but we just hadn't gotten over the hump of having that big result. I think we did that here and it showed us and (we) have the belief in the partnership that we can do this consistently.

South Africa's Raven Klaasen, right, and New Zealand's Michael Venus return the ball to Mike Bryan and Jack Sock of the United States during their men's doubles final. Photo / AP.

"We showed ourselves we can play with the top guys consistently and perform well at the big tournaments."

Venus and Klaasen fought back from a set down twice in the final on Sunday morning (NZ time), but were unable to take the deciding set, with Sock and Bryan winning 6-3 6-7 6-3 5-7 7-5 in just over three and a half hours.

Tension built throughout the deciding set as neither team were able to get an early break. But a 5-5 the blow came for the Americans, breaking Klaasen's serve and going on to close out the match in the following game.

On championship point, there was an exchange at the net which ended when Klaasen put a volley into the net to end a hard-fought final.

It ended a successful tournament for Venus, despite walking away without the title, as he also made the semifinals in the mixed doubles with Katarina Srebotnik of Slovenia.

All up, the Kiwi played 36 sets in the last fortnight, collecting $247,000 in prize money.

"I've played a lot of set the last two weeks," Venus said. "Now that we've finished I'm a little bit tired, but I'm really happy with how my body held up...that didn't play a factor in fading at the end or anything."

Venus was now looking forward to a week or two of rest, before getting into preparation for the US Open at the end of August.

He and Klaasen were likely to return to the courts at the Citi Open in Washington at the end of July, before heading north for the Rogers Cup in Toronto in early August and on to the western & Southern Open in Cincinnati the week after.

"There's three great opportunities in a row then we'll take a week off and practice in New York and get ready for the US Open.

"There's plenty of tennis left to be played for the rest of the year and some great opportunities still in front of us."