Oberleitner/Schwärzler won the double title in 52 minutes

In September 2022, Joel Schwarzler played his first international men’s tournament at the NÖ Open powered by EVN, the ATP 100 Challenger in Tulln, in doubles alongside Neil Oberleitner. In their second appearance together, the two have now managed to win their first title: the 17-year-old future only hope Vorarlberg (928 ATP double) and the 24-year-old Viennese player (154 ATP double) won the ITF title W15 with difficulty. The court event in Heraklion on Saturday won the dual competition on the Greek island of Crete. The second seeded Austrian duo beat Cypriots Sergis Kyratzis (ATP Doubles 1143) and Eleftherios Neus (ATP Doubles 1143) 6:0, 6:3 in the final after just 52 minutes of play. For Schwarzler, this is the second International Men’s Cup win this year and in his career after Kottingbrunn (also ITF M15) three months ago, and the recent winner of the ITF J500 in Osaka and the ITF Junior Finals in Chengdu will move up the standings. Double the world rankings by approximately 165 places. For Oberleitner, this is the 27th international success in men’s doubles in his career, and the fourth and youngest of the season. However, there is no chance of improving his ranking for him, as this year he still has an impressive four titles in a row since the end of last year.

Oberleitner/Schwarzler first beat Nikolay Nedelchev of Bulgaria (ATP Doubles 1202) and Michael Chu of the United States (ATP Doubles 1423) 6:4, 7:5, then Tuna Altuna of Turkey (ATP Doubles 1423) Professionals) in the quarter-finals 1063) and Moroccan. Younes Al-Alami Al-Arousi (ATP doubles 912) with scores of 6:4 and 6:3 before the decisive match of the tournament came. On Friday, the two defeated David Stevenson (ATP Doubles 903) and Harry Wendelken (ATP Doubles 608) 4:6, 7:6 (3), 13:11, after defending a match point in the match tiebreaker. . Oberleitner/Schwarzler were already behind by 4:6, 2:5: “Until then the Brits were more solid and consistent, then Joel and Neil started to come back much better and the others became a bit nervous,” said Philipp Gill, a local resident. Itinerant coach for contract player ÖTV Schwärzler. “The match tiebreaker was up and down: 4:1 leading, 4:7 trailing, 9:7 leading, 10:11 trailing, 13:11 won.” “They were the dominant doubles today, they came back very well and served well, they only wavered a little at 6:0, 5:1, but in the end they deserved the win,” said Kyratzis/News.

In singles, Oberleitner (ATP 501) and Schwarzler (ATP 1171) both reached the round of 16 with two sets wins. Here Oberleitner, ranked fourth, lost 1:6, 4:6 to British qualifier Sean Hodkin (ATP 1159). Schwarzler put his talent to the test again, but lost to ATP Top 500 No. 2 Sebastian Gemma of Romania (ATP 470) 6:3, 4:6, 1:6 after leading the set. However, both Austrians took home one ATP point each – and eventually also the double trophy.