HTT-Elite guests at the premiere of the Flötzersteig Open 500

It’s gonna happen one at a time! After the third Grand Slam tournament of the year in HTT-Wimbledon, the Prat…

It’s gonna happen one at a time! After the third Grand Slam tournament of the year in HTT-Wimbledon, the Prater Cup and the Floridsdorf Open, the next event highlights with Kitzbühel and the 1000 Euro OTC Open are already approaching. But before the HTT-Tross starts moving towards Gamsstadt next week, a completely new tournament is on the agenda as a dress rehearsal, so to speak. The premiere of the Flötzersteig Open promises hobby tennis at its best this weekend. With 5 players from the current Top 20, the field of participants of the 665th clay court tournament in HTT history is absolutely impressive, and even behind it, absolute HTT high-calibre players and great stars guarantee a top-class and exciting tennis festival. A small preview of the Flötzersteig Open 2018 by C.L

Actually, the organizers of the Flötzsteig Open 500 had set only modest goals in the run-up to their HTT debut. Around the triple season winner and local hero Matthias Wolf a tournament was to be set up, which was to serve as a foundation for a longer-term and above all successful future of the Flötzersteig Open in the calendar of the HTT. “If we could win one or two HTT superstars besides Matthias Wolf for our tournament, that would be a fine thing,” emphasized Flötzersteig member Herbert Gruner. Now: Besides the current No. 2 of the HTT computer ranking and local hero Matthias Wolf, the Flötzersteig premiere in the HTT calendar has a truly bombastic field of participants. For example, the reigning HTT Wimbledon winner Bernhard Scheidl and the newly crowned Floridsdorf Open 500 Champion Maximilian Wild are two more top ten players coming to Vienna’s 14th district.

But the HTT celebrity and star density at the Flötzersteig Open 500 goes far beyond the aforementioned top ten trio. The elite of the HTT is settling in Vienna-Penzing, and still has an enormous level to offer even beyond the top ten. Dominik Jaros – this year’s Top Ten player and last year’s HTT Tour Finals starter Filip Markovic from Team Donaufeld complete the top 20 starters. Behind them, however, sounding names with the highest competence in tennis, who also want to have an important word to say about the title, are romping about in a superbly balanced field of competitors. For example Dominik Negrin of the Army TC. The HTT First Bank Open 500 winner of the year 2014, was in the semifinals at the HTT French Open this year, and counts sand on his favourite surface among the narrow circle of favourites at every HTT tournament. Or did one of the boys make the breakthrough at the Flötzersteig Open of all places? With Theo Berger, Gerald Dominik, Benjamin O Brien or Raffael Gruber there is enough youthful quality at the start. Peter Rathhammer from UTC Judenau and the UTC Mistelbach duo Martin Mayrl and Klaus Ribitsch are other sporting heavyweights in the tableau. China’s HTT superstar Johnny Ye, Hans Kunst and the new Prater Cup champ Konstantin Samlukov from Russia will also have chances as outsiders.

The really impressive field of participants at the Flötzersteig Open 500 is rounded off with two really big names from the more recent HTT history. The 2-time HTT Tour Finals winner and 16-time title winner Philipp Schneider will be guest in Vienna-Penzing, hoping for a trend reversal in a season that has so far been rather mixed, in which the now 38-year-old has reached the semi-finals of the Cash4Car Cup as the best result. His last title dates back to October 2016, and as the current number 23 he enters the tournament with a ranking that is rather modest by his standards.

The HTT community is eagerly awaiting the comeback of the year and the first appearance of former ranking first Damian Roman. The Romanian exceptional player of TC Strebersdorf, among others 3 times HTT-US-Open winner and with 17 tournament victories the most successful international player of the HTT-Open era since 1990, can only be found in the current computer ranking at position 69, and thus not in the seed list of the glossy Flötzersteig Open. The date of the tournament was a stroke of luck for those responsible at Flötzersteig, because the 36-year-old from Negresti Oas wants to get himself going for his planned title defence in Kitzbühel at the 63rd season’s tournament. One year ago, Roman’s last appearance at the HTT took place in Gamsburg, and of course all experts and insiders of the HTT ask themselves the question before his season debut: Where does he actually stand as the HTT superstar of the year 2016? Is he just looking for his form on Flötzersteig, is he hoping for one or two clay court matches with strong opponents to “play warmly” for Kitz, or can he even reach for career title no. 18?