Prüger declassifies Szabados in “training match” of group A

HTT season-dominator Lukas Prüger has won the first prize late Thursday evening with a fast train…

HTT season dominator Lukas Prüger has finished the group stage of this year’s HTT Tour finals late Thursday evening with a cantal victory over Wolf-Bewzinger Andreas Szabados, which he won in a fast train, and with his third victory in the preliminary round he also kept his white vest in the big HTT season final of the best eight players. In the Night Session of the sixth match day, the top seeded defending champion declassified the triple winner of the season, Andreas Szabados, in a match that was meaningless for his promotion to the semi-finals in only 49 minutes with 6:1, 6:3, and was the only player of the tournament to enter the preliminary round without losing a set, where he will face Maximilian Wild in the duel of numbers 1 and 2. From the HTT Tour Finals at UTC La Ville reported for hobbytennistour.at C.L

HTT industry leader Lukas Prüger has played his way into the semi-finals of the HTT Tour finals for the second time in a row without losing the preliminary round with another impressive performance. After his eighth individual victory in the HTT season finals at the Altmannsdorf branch, he is only two steps away from a possible title defence. The 20-year-old from the Schwechater TC also extended his current HTT winning streak to 14 matches without defeat with a never-threatened cantata victory over Szabados, and with the 51st single victory in 2018, the ranking leader also gained the necessary self-confidence for the semi-final hit against Maximilian Wild on Friday evening.

In a game that did not go beyond the character of a better training match, Szabados had his “little” sense of achievement with his own serve right at the beginning, after which Prüger dictated the first set at will with six games won in a row. At the end of an impressive series were even eight games won in a row, which brought the 7-time winner of the season in a relaxed and fun last single of the preliminary round in the second set 2-0 lead. Without pressure – in view of the meaninglessness – and also because Prüger approached the matter a little too loosely, Szabados took his well-deserved games to the interim 3:2 lead, before Prüger with a brilliant finish converted his working time at the center court into short-time work in view of the upcoming semifinals. With 42 winners and a total of 60 points, the HTT No. 1 went to the last PK of the preliminary round.

“Since it was not about anything anymore from the starting position, I tried to see the match with Szabados as a better training game. My first two matches weren’t so convincing, so it was about time I showed some clever tennis again”, said the 20 year old. And that will also be necessary, because in the semifinals Maximilian Wild, second in the rankings, is waiting in the updraft: “I will try to pull my tennis through. Clever first serves, powerful playing, and if the Maxi also plays well, then it will be a great game”, says the first in the rankings. “I don’t want to judge my performance today. It was a training game for me, too. He did it sovereignly, but from the head I could not motivate myself to play two hours full in this game. Of course, I was disappointed that after the Vukicevic win against Wolf, it was not about anything anymore for me, but I didn’t want to empty the game completely. But I think we made the best of the situation,” said the seventh ranked player from Lower Austria.