ANDRIA, November 21, 2017

The ATP Challenger Tour has returned to the South of Italy for its final week of the season. The €43,000 Andria e Castel del Monte Challenger is the traditional season-ending tournament on the indoor hard courts of the local Palasport.

Top seed and home hope Stefano Travaglia fell in the opening round on Tuesday to fellow Italian Andreas Basso 6-3, 4-6, 6-7. Basso, ranked World No. 337, withstood 14 aces, hitting nine of his own to prevail after two hours and 10 minutes. The 24-year-old from Genova will next face either Franko Skugor of Croatian or Laurynas Grigelis of Lithuania, runner-up to Lukas Lacko at last week’s event in Brescia.

Second favourite, Ricardas Berankis, opened his title bid on Monday with a 6-1, 7-6 victory over Alessandro Bega of Italy. The World No. 141 from Lithuania sent down seven aces, winning 83 per cent of his first service points to advance in one hour and 23 minutes. Next up for Berankis will be Belgian qualifier Christopher Heyman, who beat Andrea Arnaboldi 7-6, 6-4.

Bosnia and Herzogiva’s Mirza Basic and Aldin Setkic, seeded third and fourth in Andria, also found their way into the second round. Basic cruised past Slovakian Filip Horansky 6-1, 6-3 in only 45 minutes and Setkic defeated Denis Matsukevich of Russia 6-4, 6-3.