Markus Neuhauser starts into the Mai-Masters with an edge victory

For some it is just another stop on the way to their big season goal “HTT…

For some, it is just another stop on the way to the big “HTT-French Open” season goal, for others it is a very important sand court tournament of the second highest Masters category, but in any case the 23rd edition of the May Masters Series 1000 event at UTC La Ville is the best-attended HTT 1000 event since one and a half years and since the November 2016 edition, when also six men from the current top ten competed for the title. Above all, however, the third HTT Masters 1000 tournament of this season is also the great chance for all participants, in the absence of the 1000 dominator of the past 12 months Lukas Prüger, to sign up for the list of 51 winners of the HTT Masters Series 1000 tournaments. C.L reports from the UTC La Ville

For 11 tournaments, the tournament series of the HTT Masters 1000 competitions, each with 1000 victory points, non-cash prizes and prize money, was in an inexplicable crisis. At least as far as the number of participants in the top ten stars of the scene was concerned. In 11 events since the November Masters Series 1000 Tournament 2016 at UTC La Ville, none of these high endowed and highly jazzed tournaments could welcome more than 4 top ten players. 110 possible starting places for the HTT superstars of the top 10 were logically available in these last 11 tournaments; the commitment of the best HTT players during this period was sufficient for just 29 entries. Makes a pathetic 26 percent, a bankruptcy declaration without equal. This phenomenon cannot or was not explainable, especially since the tournaments behind the top ten elite were always filled to the brim.

At the third seasonal tournament on the Masters Series 1000 level on this first weekend in May at UTC La Ville, everything is definitely different once again. The HTT French Open, which will take place at UTC La Ville from 31 May to 6 June 2018, will be one of the last major tournaments before the actual season’s highlight on red ash. 6 men from the top ten are at the start, 7 winners of the season honour the 33rd seasonal tournament on the Altmannsdorf branch, and with a qualifying cut of ITN 4.5 in almost all first-round matches of the 640th sand court tournament of history no wishes remain unfulfilled. Out of a fantastic field the top seeded reigning HTT Wimbledon winner Vladimir Vukicevic, HTT Australian Open Champion Markus Neuhauser and HTT Olympic Champion Martin Mayer stand out. With a perfect mixture of established HTT stars such as tour finals finalist Matthias Wolf, Styrian tennis export Alexander Schager, the 2-time Masters winner Philipp Schneider, or the HTT-Australian Open winner of 2015 Bernhard Scheidl and the guard of up-and-coming young stars such as last year’s finalist Adrian Vorhemus, Lenny Wilmink, Gerald Dominik or Paul Werren, you can look forward to a great tennis festival on the Altmannsdorf branch.

The qualifiers started Friday afternoon in early summer conditions, with Sebastian Hickl qualifying in his 43rd career tournament and his only third Masters Series 1000 participation with a clear 6-2, 6-1 win over Martin Spengler for an explosive qualifying final of a special kind. Because in the duel for a place in the main field and a meeting with March HTT 500 winner Martin Mayer, the 25-year-old gets to do it with his team mate from TC Strebersdorf Marcus Schischlik. Meanwhile, two of the favourites in round 1 have made a safe start to the 23rd edition of the May Masters Series 1000 tournament at UTC La Ville. Baden Open semi-finalist Andreas Szabados from TC Seebenstein declassified Andreas Tolunay from Team Donaufeld 6-0, 6-1 on his debut on HTT Masters Series 1000 level and is finally hoping for the long-awaited HTT breakthrough on his favourite surface Sand. As expected, HTT-Australian Open winner Markus Neuhauser also started his first sand court tournament on HTT level. The 24-year-old duped Thomas Janzso in an entertaining 50 minutes 6:1, 6:0, impressively underlining his expectation of season’s tournament victory number 3.