BERGAMO, February 20, 2019

The ATP Challenger Tour has returned to Italy for the first of more than 20 tournaments staged in the country with the popular indoor hard-court event in Bergamo, held at the PalaAgnelli this week. Evgeny Donskoy, the tournament’s top seed of the €46,000 Internazionali di Tennis Trofeo Faip-Perrel, opened his title bid on Wednesday and advanced to the third round.

Alexander Bublik (photo. Antonio Milesi)

The World No. 96 eased past Bernabé Zapata Miralles of Spain 6-4, 6-2. Donskoy, the lone top 100 player in the singles main draw of the ATP Challenger 80 event, won 85 per cent of his first service points to seal victory in only 62 minutes.

Next up for the Russian will be Stefano Napolitano, one of seven Italians, who found their way into the stage of the last 16. No. 14 seeded Napolitano beat Cem Ilkel from Turkey 6-3, 6-4 in one hour and 18 minutes.

Hungarian Challenger Open champion and No. 3 seed Alexander Bublik was forced to retire in his match against French qualifier Baptiste Crepatte, trailing 3-6, 2-5. The 21-year-old from Kazakhstan suffered from a knee injury. Crepatte will next play Arthur de Greef. The No. 15 seed from Belgium defeated Danilo Petrovic of Serbia 6-3, 6-4. The encounter lasted 64 minutes.