Six players have managed to amass three Challenger titles this year – Matteo Arnaldi, Francisco Comesana, Hamad Medjedovic, Andy Murray, Max Purcell, and Thiago Seyboth Wild. Two of them achieved that feat last week. The other winner was Terence Atmane, who claimed his maiden trophy in the joint-shortest completed final ever at 43 minutes. Read back on last week’s action:
Como
Thiago Seyboth Wild slowed down a bit after Roland Garros, but he was fully back to his incredible first half of the season form here. The Brazilian’s draw was tough from the get-go with Franco Agamenone in the opening round. But it soon turned out that nothing was tough for Seyboth Wild this week as he made the final without dropping a set, not even a tie-break required. Perhaps the most impressive was how he crushed last week’s Prague champion, Rudolf Molleker.
Having fallen out of the top 100 this year, Pedro Martinez has to grind through the Challenger Tour again. Just like Seyboth Wild, he came to Como after losing in the US Open qualifying. With three previous Challenger semifinals this season, the Spaniard finally managed to get over the line by beating Stefano Napolitano in the final four. He also didn’t drop a set on the way to the championship match, although he needed two tie-breaks (against Napolitano and Samuel Vincent Ruggeri).
The easy power on the Seyboth Wild gave him the edge early on, but Martinez fought back to take the opener by turning defense into offense well and capitalizing on the Brazilian’s errors. It was a very high-quality affair and the pace of the rallies made both players weary by the time they got a decider. Martinez seemed to have the physical edge, but his opponent kept himself in the game with some good serving and eventually made the key breakthrough. Seyboth Wild claimed his 4th Challenger final (3rd this year) 5-7 6-2 6-3 and is now very likely to break the top 100 after the US Open (only an extreme set of results can keep him out). He’s playing Genoa next, while Martinez goes to Seville.
Mallorca
It was a bit unclear if Hamad Medjedovic was going to be as dangerous on hard courts as he was on clay, but the Serbian quickly made sure to make this discussion irrelevant. The brutal power on his shots was so tough to handle for his opponents in Mallorca last week. Laurent Lokoli was the only player who took a set off him on the way to the final as the 20-year-old fended off the two dangerous lefties in Mattia Bellucci and Daniel Rincon next.
Harold Mayot also lost in the first round of US Open qualifying before coming over to Mallorca. His best result of the season so far was a Challenger semifinal at Aix-en-Provence. The Frenchman managed to beat the resurgent Joao Sousa from a break down in the decider, before coming back from 2-6 3-5 down against Nick Hardt. By making the final, Mayot secured his second opportunity to grab a Challenger title (Tampere 2022).
Medjedovic’s power was really bothering Mayot early on, but the Frenchman managed to get back into the match and was looking much stronger physically by the time they went to a decider. The response from the Serbian was brilliant. He served impeccably in the 3rd and won the best point of the evening with a 32-shot rally to break Mayot for 2-0. Medjedovic won his 4th Challenger title (3rd this year) 6-2 4-6 6-2 and finds himself about 100 points away from the top 100. He’ll now be part of Serbia’s Davis Cup team in a couple of weeks, while the runner-up plays Istanbul next.
Zhangjiagang
Terence Atmane came to Zhangjiagang fresh from US Open qualifying where he wasted match points against James Duckworth. It all evens out in the end as the Frenchman had to save six such chances himself against Fajing Sun in the opening round here. One of them was a dead net cord, although he was blasting his forehand on the other points. He then went on to overcome a pretty tough draw to beat Ricardas Berankis or Li Tu and make his first Challenger final.
Mikalai Haliak made his Challenger main draw debut in Izmir a long while ago (2017), but hadn’t appeared at this level since until Zhuhai last week. The Belarusian went to China early and got his maiden ITF title (25K Baotou), before going on this Challenger run as well. He had to start from the qualifying and despite a weaker path to the final than Atmane, was pretty impressive in cleaning up six opponents in a row without dropping a set.
The final turned out to be a total beatdown. The Frenchman wasn’t feeling the nerves at all and came out crushing the serve and forehand combination. Haliak didn’t really have an idea as to how to steer the patterns of play towards something he would be more comfortable with. Atmane won his maiden Challenger title 6-1 6-2, taking all 22/22 points on first serve. The whole affair lasted only 43 minutes, making it the joint-shortest final ever along with Jo-Wilfried Tsonga beating Dudi Sela in Cassis 2019. Both finalists are playing Shanghai next week, Haliak with a special exempt.
Challenger Tour magic:
Ladies and gentlemen, here's a serve +1 frontal tweener.
Obviously Paire wasn't going to let Seyboth Wild come out of this match as the only player to have hit a tweener.
📷: @ATPChallenger pic.twitter.com/A8H2CwAKqH— Damian Kust (@damiankust) September 2, 2023
Events held this week:
- AON Open Challenger (Genoa, Challenger 125, clay)
- LX Copa Sevilla (Challenger 125, yellow clay)
- NO OPEN Powered by EVN (Tulln, Challenger 100, clay)
- Road to the Rolex Shanghai Masters (Challenger 100, hard)
- Istanbul Challenger TED Open (Challenger 75, hard)
- Cassis Open Provence by Cabesto (Challenger 75, hard)
Top 100 players in action:
- Alexander Shevchenko, Federico Coria (Genoa)
- Roberto Carballes Baena, Jaume Munar, Facundo Diaz Acosta, Hugo Gaston (Seville)
- Christopher O’Connell, Yosuke Watanuki (Shanghai)
- Albert Ramos-Vinolas, Jurij Rodionov (Tulln)
- Alexandre Muller (Cassis)
First-round matches to watch:
Genoa
- Stefano Travaglia vs (5) Thiago Monteiro
- (4) Zsombor Piros vs Andrea Pellegrino
- Riccardo Bonadio vs (3) Thiago Seyboth Wild
- (8) Andrea Vavassori vs Duje Ajdukovic
Seville
- (WC) Fernando Verdasco vs (5) Hugo Gaston
- (8) Pablo Llamas Ruiz vs Federico Delbonis
- Raul Brancaccio vs (2/WC) Pedro Cachin
Tulln
- (1) Albert Ramos-Vinolas vs Filip Misolic
- Elmar Ejupovic vs (2) Jurij Rodionov
Shanghai
- (1) Christopher O’Connell vs Luke Saville
- (6) Bu Yunchaokete vs (WC) Te Rigele
- Alex Bolt vs (2) Yosuke Watanuki
Rigele met Yunchaokete in the opening round at Zhangjiagang last week, upsetting him 7-6 in the 3rd set.
Istanbul
- (4) Dino Prizmic vs Louis Wessels
- (8) Norbert Gombos vs Denis Yevseyev
Cassis
- (1) Alexandre Muller vs Joao Sousa
- Dan Added vs (2) Liam Broady
Main Photo Credit: Susan Mullane – USA TODAY Sports
