Quartet of young stars sets direction at October HTT-500 tournament

The biggest HTT event of the year, the HTT-Erste Bank Open 500 at the UTC La Ville and the Wiener Stadthal…

The biggest HTT event of the year, the HTT First Bank Open 500 at the UTC La Ville and the Vienna Stadthalle have been beaten, from now on it’s like everyday life on the hobby tennis tour again. Until the next big hit and the final highlight of this year’s season, the HTT Tour Finals from 24 November to 1 December 2018 at UTC La Ville, there are only four weeks left in which three tournaments of the three top HTT categories are still on the programme. The 27th edition of the October HTT-500 tournament will kick off this last weekend in October. A traditional event with a 27-year history, many big and prominent names in the winners list, which this year is the 435th indoor tournament of the HTT Open era but only second class. With only two players from the current Top 30 of the HTT Computer Ranking, the October HTT-500 tournament has probably never been so easy to win as this year. The two top stars of the 330th HTT-500 tournament in HTT history, Bernhard Scheidl and Andreas Szabados, will only enter the action on Sunday, but interesting pairings have already had the first two tournament days to offer. From the UTC La Ville reported for hobbytennistour.at C.L

HTT Wimbledon winner Bernhard Scheidl and Lower Austria specialist Andreas Szabados are the two outstanding players of the 27th edition at the October HTT-500 tournament at UTC La Ville, and on the last October weekend of the year the big favourites for the title at the 118th seasonal tournament at UTC La Ville, and the successor of last year’s winner Alexander Schager. Only the two top ten stars have managed to succeed in the current field this year at the three highest tournament levels of the Hobby Tennis Tour. The rest of the field earned their spurs and ranking points on the 250cc level and down, but are still at a respectable distance from the two top ten aces at the start outside the current top 30. Nevertheless, one can expect top performances and perhaps a surprise from one or the other young HTT crack crack.

One candidate would be Fabian Dopf, for example. The 17-year-old, currently No. 58 in the HTT Computer Ranking and still the No. 8 of the October HTT 500 tournament, has already reached the quarter-finals of the indoor classic on the Altmannsdorf branch on the first two days of the tournament. Dopf, who made his HTT debut seven years ago in October 2011 at a Challenger as a 10-year-old boy, is reaching for the first time after a semi-final entry at a tournament of the highest HTT category after two sovereign victories over the WAC duo Nikolaus Kremser and Gerald Maier in the twelfth attempt. Remarkable about the Dopf double pack was above all the clear two-movement success at the start over Nikolaus Kremser and thus the HTT French Open finalist from 2012.

In the fight for a place in the preliminary round, the WAC party scare on Sunday evening with Gregor Schwab, and thus one of the seven winners of the season in the 28er main field of the Otkober HTT-500 tournament, will have to deal. The 16-year-old Austrian from Lower Austria won the preparation tournament for the HTT French Open in May this year, eliminated his opponents without losing a set and is now in the HTT 500 quarter-finals for the first time on his return to the Hobby Tennis Tour. On his way there, the tall May HTT-250 champion initially benefited from the first-round cancellation of the Carinthian Tour newcomer Josef Prix, with which he won 6:0, 6:2 over substitute Miguel Marn without any problems. An announcement, however, represented Schwab’s second success to the day. Schwab beat Herwig Ebner, who was seeded No. 4 and already played semifinals and finals at the First Serve Vienna Tenniscup 500 this year, 6-2, 6-3 and thus completed the quarter-finals of the Next Gen duel with Fabian Dopf.

In the group of the first challengers of the togesetzt duo with Bernhard Scheidl and Andreas Szabados there are beside Dopf & Schwab two other hopeful young stars. There’s Lenny Wilmink, 16 years young and in March of this year a big winner at the March HTT-250 tournament at UTC La Ville. On the very large HTT stage, the No. 40 of the HTT computer ranking list still owes a lot in terms of top results. A quarter-final at the September Masters Series 1000 tournament is Wilmink’s best result in the circle of the best, and he could equalise that on Sunday if he lived up to his role as favourites in the last 16 against Alen Karabegovic. Great expectations are also placed these days in Theo Berger. The young star of the Altmannsdorfer TC, who this year has had a roller coaster ride in results and performances on the HTT, is perhaps even considered the most promising of the young stars in the tournament at the moment in terms of title win. The 17-year-old, who managed to hold his own in the top 20 until the middle of the season, had to accept a relapse in the ranking from the top 60 in September after having missed his title twice, and then took a step back in his tournament planning. In the October 250cc tournament at Terra Rossa, Berger found his way back to success with his title win, confirmed his upward trend at the HTT First Bank Open 500 by making it to the round of 16, and wants to continue this trend today, Sunday, at least by reaching the quarter-finals.