COMO, September 3, 2016
Marco Cecchinato and Kenny de Schepper will compete in Sunday’s singles final of the €42,500 ATP Challenger Torneo Cittá di Como. The eighth seed from Italy outlasted the tournament’s number three Taro Daniel, winning 6-3, 1-6, 7-6.
Marco Cecchinato advanced to the final in Como
Daniel had a slow start into the encounter, which took place in hot and sunny conditions, converting his first point of the match only in the third game. Cecchinato was solid from the baseline and put a lot of variety in his shots. The 23-year-old from Palermo went for the drop shot winner a couple of times, which might be an inluence by his coach Simone Vagnozzi. Daniel, however, fought back in the second set, when he started to find his rhythm.
The world number 101 from Japan also had some chances for a break at the beginning of the final set but could not capitalize on them. Towards the end of the match, Daniel seemed to run out of steam and Cecchinato took the tie-break of the third set 7-1 to prevail in two hours and 17 minutes.
Kenny de Schepper
De Schepper edged past Adrian Ungur, winning 6-4, 7-5. The 29-year-old Frenchman sent down five aces and broke his opponent’s serve six times to advance to his first final since the Le Gossier Challenger in April 2014. The encounter lasted one hour and 39 minutes.
De Schepper and Cecchinato will meet for the first time. The former world number 62 from France claimed his last title in Cherbourg two years ago. In June, Cecchinato lifted the Aspria Cup in Milan, situated only 50 kilometres away from Como.
Jebavy And Martin Clinch Doubles Title
Earlier the day, fourth seeds Roman Jebavy and Andrej Martin won the doubles final 3-6, 6-1, 10-5 over Nils Langer and Gerald Melzer. The match lasted 63 minutes.
It was the third team title for the Czech-Slovakian combination after the pair had triumphed on the ITF Pro Circuit twice before.
Doubles finalists in Como
“We produced more mistakes in the beginning of the match and consequently we lost the opening set,” Martin told Tennis TourTalk after the final. “We felt that we could do better and we showed some good games in second set. We said to ourselves to keep going like this in the final set and we showed our energy to eventually seal the win.”
The last time Jebavy and Martin won a doubles title was in 2012. “He is a really nice guy and we are good friends but we do not play together very often. This makes it even more special to win the title here together. We hope to add some more in the future.”
Martin himself has played a very successful season so far. The 26-year-old finished runner up at the Konzum Croatia Open in Umag, made it to the third round at the Olympics in Rio and broke into the top 100 for the first time in his career.
“This year I made a step forward in my career. I achieved some really good results. I gained a big amount of experience this season and I hope that I can build on it in order to continue with my good level of tennis,” Martin said and will next play the Copa Sevilla Challenger as well as the Davis Cup Play-Offs for Slovakia in Australia.
