Igoshin-Prashanth capture doubles title

Alexander Igoshin of Russia and N. Vijay Sundar Prashanth of India were yesterday evening crowned Men’s Doubles champions in the Bahrain ITF World Tennis Tour 2019 at Bahrain Tennis Club (BTC). The top-seeded pair defeated the Dutch tandem of Jesper De Jong and Sidane Pontjodikromo 6-7 (5), 7-6 (5), 10-8 in a super tie-break to claim their first title as a partnership. They had previously teamed up twice in the past, but only now have taken home some silverware. “For sure we know each other better now as this is our fifth match together, so that helped with our win,” 27-year-old Igoshin said.

Added 32-year-old Prashanth: “We are also friends off court, so that helps us click on court.” The two finalists were presented their respective trophies in an awarding ceremony held after their final. Handing over their awards were His Majesty the King’s Youth and Sport Advisor Saleh Isa bin Hindi, Bahrain Tennis Federation (BTF) Vice-President Shaikh Abdulaziz bin Mubarak Al Khalifa, BTC President Khamis Al Muqla and other BTF, BTC and tournament officials. Meanwhile, fourth seed Tim Rijthoven of the Netherlands and Tomas Machac of the Czech Republic set up a mouth-watering clash in the Men’s Singles final, which will be played today at 5pm.

All are welcome to attend. Van Rijthoven defeated Vitaliy Sachko of Ukraine 6-2, 6-2 to advance to the title match while Machac ousted Dutchman Jesper De Jong 6-0, 6-4 to book his berth. De Jong had a heartbreaking day. He entered yesterday’s action with a chance to finish the tournament with an impressive title-double, but he is set to come away empty-handed. In the Men’s Doubles final, De Jong and Pontjodikromo raced out to a 4-1 lead in the first set but Igoshin and Prashanth were able to fight back and force a tie-break, which the Dutch pair took 7-5.

Igoshin and Prashanth had now found their groove but still needed to go the maximum to take the second set with a similar tie-break score. Neither pair were able to break their opponents the entire set. Igoshin and Prashanth started the super tie-break well and there was no denying them in the end, closing out the contest with a strong finish. “We just kept going, point for point,” Igoshin said about fightback back from a set down. Prashanth said, “We told ourselves after the first set to just stay positive and fight.

We knew we would have just one shot to get back into the match, so we took that chance. In the end, we knew it was going to be a long tie-break, so we just played one point at a time and stayed focused, and we won.” In Van Rijthoven’s victory, the Dutch ace gave up the match’s very first game to his rival but then broke Sachko twice to help build a 5-1 advantage. He then closed out the set in the next two games. The second set was almost similar to the first, with Van Rijthoven breaking his fellow 21-year-old twice en route to sealing the match.

In the other semi-final, it was a battle between two talented 18-year-olds. Machac broke De Jong in the very first game and rode his momentum to a clean sweep of the first set. The second appeared to be headed the same direction with the Czech talent taking a commanding 3-0 lead, but De Jong fought back, breaking Machac in the fourth game. Both players then held serve the rest of the way, which was enough for Machac to triumph.