De la Puente and Fernandez thwart Dutch clean sweep at Doubles Masters
Top seeds Martin de la Puente and Gustavo Fernandez thwarted local hopes of a Dutch clean sweep of the ITF Wheelchair Doubles Masters titles on the penultimate day of play in Oss as the Spanish-Argentinian partnership claimed their first men’s doubles title at the year-end championship on the UNIQLO Wheelchair Tennis Tour.
On a day when all the top-seeded partnerships were victorious, Sam Schroder and Niels Vink retained the quad doubles title after defeating Heath Davidson of Australia and Robert Shaw of Canada 6-1 6-0, while Diede de Groot and Aniek van Koot completed a hat-trick of women’s titles together at the Doubles Masters after beating Jiske Griffioen and Momoko Ohtani 6-0 6-4.
“It's been a great year and a great first year playing pretty much all the tournaments together and trying to be the top team of the year and I think we did a great job doing that,” said Fernandez after he and De La Puente beat Tom Egberink and Ruben Spaargaren 6-1 6-2 in 70 minutes to dampen the spirits of a largely Dutch crowd that had already witnessed two all-Dutch title wins.
“Each one of us has won one Grand Slam (with other partners) and I'm really looking forward to playing together next year in the Slams. We enjoy practising a lot together, we enjoy being together on court and we're good friends, so everything is a little bit more enjoyable," he added. "I'm really looking forward to the future because I think good things are coming for us. We've worked really hard for that, so it's time to keep pushing.”
De la Puente and Fernandez spectacularly reversed the result of their round-robin group match earlier in the week against Egberink and Spaargaren, the Dutch duo winning that encounter 2-6 6-3 (10-4) and De la Puente was understandably as thrilled as Fernandez.
“It’s really amazing, to be honest. As I’ve said before we were trying to reach the top of this event next year or some years after, but we’re really teaming very well at the moment,” said the Spaniard. “We're a very good partnership and I'm very happy, very happy for me, and very happy for Gustavo, because I know how tough it has been for us to make this event. We're going to really enjoy it and I think it's going to stay in our memory for a long time.”
Fifteen-time Grand Slam champions De Groot and Van Koot continued to add to their list of major achievements and while victory in Oss brough them their third Doubles Masters title as a partnership, beating Griffioen and Ohtani gave De Groot her fifth Doubles Masters crown with three different partners. Van Koot, formerly a two-time champion partnering Griffioen, is now a six-time Doubles Masters winner with her four different partners.
“I feel great - very relieved that we ended on a high note,” said Van Koot. “I'm a bit exhausted, mentally, as it was also the last tournament of the year but yes, I’m very happy with the results. Tonight we have an official dinner here in Oss, so I'm looking forward to that and then some rest.”
“After last night’s demo (when De Groot partnered Mansour Bahrami), it was a lot of fun but I was very late to bed, so hopefully it’s an early night now,” said the world No.1 ranked singles and doubles player.
“I think the official dinner is going to be a lot of fun tonight, but also just a great celebration of not just a good final but also a good week. Then it’s on to tomorrow. It's always nice to have familiar faces in the stands and lots of chairs were taken (for the Doubles Masters finals), so that's a good sign for the sport and for tomorrow.”
De Groot will join Schroder and Vink in returning to court on Sunday for the NEC Wheelchair Singles Masters finals, when she faces Yui Kamiji in the women’s singles final for the fifth successive year.
Schroder and Vink will play each other in the quad singles final for the second year in a row.
“This title feels amazing for me, especially because I'm doing it with Sam. We like to playing alongside each other and this one is a special one to add to our list,” said Vink, who will now attempt to add his second successive Singles Masters title.
“I think there are a lot of spectators coming tomorrow, because I’ve been told it is sold out, but yes, there are going to be a lot of fans on my side, I know that.”
Schroder has plans once the Masters is complete.
“When it’s all over I will probably have some pina coladas, but there's still one more match to play tomorrow, so I cannot quite do that yet,” he said. “It's great to play here in the Netherlands; very special to witness everyone in the house (tennis centre) today and we're going to have another good match tomorrow.
“We've been playing every single tournament together in doubles and playing singles finals, as well, against each other, so it’s the same for both of us. But it's always kind of weird to know that one day we play doubles together and win the title and the next day we fight each other for the singles title.”