HTT Challenger Finals – Title defender Rieger flies in the preliminary round

Three days of group stage at the 9th edition of the HTT Challenger Tour Finals 2018 at UTC La Ville have …

Three days of group stage at the 9th edition of the HTT Challenger Tour Finals 2018 at UTC La Ville have impressively confirmed the recent trend of the Hobby Tennis Tour. Even though experience and routine with six +30 players still reign among the top ten, a lasting and massive generational change on Austria’s largest popular sport tennis series is emerging behind them. After four teenagers already shaped the semi-finals at the previous week’s Future Finals and Valentin Kaftan, a 15-year-old, won the title at the end, the four semi-finalists of the Challenger Tour Finals, which is currently taking place, have only just outgrown their children’s shoes. Conclusion: We currently have so many children and young people playing tennis that we haven’t had in years. From the Challenger Tour Finals 2018 reports from the UTC La Ville for hobbytennistour.at C.L

The HTT 2018 season has long since reached the home straight and has traditionally been busy with the various “season finals” from mid-November to early December. After the 6th edition of the Future-Finals a week ago, these days the most successful Challenger aces are the focus of the HTT event. And this 9th edition of the Challenger Tour Finals, which has been on the Tour calendar since 2010, became an impressive showcase for the young men and women who could shape Austria’s largest popular sports platform in the future. In any case, the four qualifying matches and the 12-game Round Robin Group Phase showed more than impressively that teenagers have long set the tone in the so-called “second league” of the Hobby Tennis Tour. The youth trend with four adolescents in the semifinals of the Future Finals, which was admired just a week ago, has also continued these days in the great season finale of the Challenger stars. With an average age of just 15.25 years, Sebastian Wojta, Noah Castillo, Martin Priban and Florian Mayer have set another powerful exclamation mark for the HTT youth, and only surpassed the incomprehensible average age of 13.75 years in the Future Finals by a wafer-thin margin.

Behind the general and current youth madness circulating in the circuit – after all, the numbers 1 and 2 in the current HTT Race to La Ville are 20 years old and younger, and the upcoming HTT Next Gen Finals from 7 to 11 December will also have a top-class field of participants to offer – there are, of course, four young tennis players who achieved great things last weekend and deserved a place in the semi-finals of the HTT Challenger Finals. First and foremost Sebastian Wojta, of course, who has taken the biggest development of the stars of the final tournament in the past 10 months. The 16-year-old was the first Challenger winner of the year, and has now reached ITN-like 250cc levels. The performance of Mario Pichler, who was able to celebrate six successful games in his second Group D preliminary round game on Saturday evening in Sebastian Wojta’s 30th individual career victory, is therefore remarkable.

In the semifinal duel for a place in the final of the Challenger Tour Finals Sebastian Wojta has to deal with a young man who made a small breakthrough at the HTT this year. At the February-Challenger, the 15-year-old finally celebrated his long-awaited first tournament victory according to his playing potential. And the young man from the Dominican Republic will also be playing his full part in the music at the finals of the Challenger aces. After he proved his class in the qualification against the No. 3 of the Junior HTT Felix Maierhofer with only two games he gave away, he also left nothing burning in the group phase with two wins without losing a set – including against Kitzbühel-Challenger winner Klaus Klune.

The second semi-final of the 445th indoor tournament in HTT history will be played by the Slovakian young star Martin Priban and surprise man Florian Mayer. Priban – just like Castillo – made it through the qualifiers – after his Saturday victory over substitute Lucas Rydl yesterday, which was achieved with great effort in three sets, made it all clear with a 6:4, 6:0 victory over November-Challenger-Champion Christian Vollmann, who only qualified on the last impression. Mayer had also survived a tight three-set on Saturday against routine Oliver Fischer, before he caused the first big sensation of the tournament on the last day of the preliminary round. Last year’s winner Alexander Rieger was the second big favourite besides Wojta to be ripped out of the title rooms. Rieger found no remedy for two sets against the Future Finals Champion of the previous year, and after a 5:7, 2:6 not only missed the repeated semi-final entry at the Challenger Finals, but also his 150th career single in a possible semi-final.