BRAUNSCHWEIG, July 11, 2016
The 23rd edition of the Sparkassen Open has come to an end with Thomaz Bellucci winning Saturday’s final of the €106,500 ATP Challenger event against Inigo Cervantes in three sets.
Tournament director Volker Jäcke was happy with the week and Tennis TourTalk spoke to the successor of Michael Stich and Carl-Uwe Steeb after the last rally had been played on centre court.
“We have had another great week with exciting matches, in particular during the last day when both finals went the distance. We had a great line-up with seven top 100-players and a lot of German competitors. It is always important for the spectators to have the chance to see the locals playing. We are very pleased with this week,” the 44-year-old event organizer from the Brunswiek Marketing GmbH stated with calm voice.
More than 30,000 spectators came to the venue of the Tennis and Hockey Club Braunschweig over the last seven days, when they enjoyed the tennis during the day as well as international show acts afterwards.
“We are very proud to present those numbers, although slightly less people attended the tournament this year compared to 2015. It’s holiday time but Centre court was almost packed on Saturday with about 1,700 people watching the finals,” Jäcke explained and added that there were also a couple of other sport events taking place at the same time. “We also had the European Football Championships this week, as well as a big final in Wimbledon with Angelique Kerber, which was obviously watched by some people on TV.”
With Alberto Berasategui (1996), Gaston Gaudio (2000), Tomas Berdych (2004) and Alexander Zverev (2014), some big names have already lifted the trophy in the “Lion City”. This year was a bit more difficult to plan, as the tournament’s final entry list always depends on the Wimbledon results.
“We would have loved to present Nicolas Almagro and Dustin Brown here. Each player would have received a wild card. Unfortunately for us, they were still in doubles action at Wimbledon. In our first published official entry list we had a cut off at world number 120 with 18 players from the top 100. Seven remained in the end due to the bad weather and skewed schedule at Wimbledon.
“But it’s not only about names. The spectators just love sympathic players, who give their best on the court. If we just have the chance to present a few more top 100 players, we will be also pleased in the future.”
Sparkassen Open: ATP Challenger of the Years 2014 and 2015
Good news came from the title sponsor, which announced to extend its partnership with the tournament for the next five years after the event had won the award for the best Challenger of the Year 2015.
“We were very surprised and are very proud to receive this honour for the second year in a row. We are really looking forward to have the opportunity again to travel to London in order to attend the season finale at the O2 and to receive the award. Watching the world’s best eight men in tennis and to experience this unique atmosphere is just amazing. We will return to Braunschweig full of pride.”
“Nightlife meets Tennis” is the tournament’s successful motto with the combination of world class clay court tennis action during the day and attractive live music acts in the evening hours. It will also be the slogan for the 2017 edition and maybe a third consecutive award by the ATP will be in sight.
