Oda, Kamiji earn Japan Open title double as Schroder takes quad title
Tokito Oda and Yui Kamiji secured a third Japanese clean sweep of the Japan Open men’s singles titles in 10 years as this year’s Super Series tournament came to a close with Sam Schroder having become the second Dutchman to be crowned quad singles champion in Iizuka City in successive years.
It was a fitting end to a year of celebration as the Japan Open marked 40 years since its first edition in 1985, with Oda and Takuya Miki bringing more Japanese success as they retained the men’s doubles title while Kamiji retained the women’s doubles title alongside South Africa’s Kgothatso Montjane.
Heath Davidson and Robert Shaw also had a special reason to celebrate their quad doubles title after earning a first Super Series title as a partnership on the UNIQLO Wheelchair Tennis Tour.
Oda defeats Hewett to retain men’s singles title
Still three weeks short of his 18th birthday, second seed Tokito Oda was determined to put on a show for his home fans and he certainly did that during the opening set of a 6-1 7-6(5) victory over top seed Alfie Hewett in their third Super Series final of 2024
Oda limited Hewett to just two points in their first four games before Hewett finally got on the scoreboard at 5-1, but a forehand error from the Brit handed Oda the set.
After a medical time out for treatment to his left arm in between sets, Hewett looked to be on course to force a deciding set as he opened up a 4-0 and 5-1 lead of his own in the second set but Oda slowly started to eat into Hewett’s advantage.
Hewett had a set point at 5-4 and broke Oda’s serve to force the tie-break, but Oda would not be denied and successive forehand and backhand winners earned him the last two points of the match.
It was a second win over Hewett in two days as Oda and Takuya Miki retained the men’s doubles title with their first win over top seeds Hewett and Gordon Reid in four finals. The second seeds beat their British opponents 6-4 2-6 (10-6) after a championship tie-break on the penultimate day of competition.
Kamiji earns seventh Japan Open women’s title
World No. 2 Yui Kamiji stretched her record as the most successful women’s singles champion at the Japan Open to seven titles since 2013 as she battled back to beat third seed Aniek van Koot 2-6 6-1 6-0 after an hour and 43 minutes in the women’s singles final.
Kamiji and Momoko Ohtani began the tournament as the top two women’s seeds but hopes of an all-Japanese final as the Japan Open celebrated 40 years since its inception were ended in the semi-finals as Ohtani retired from her semi-final against Van Koot when trailing 6-4, 3-1, handing Van Koot a place in her first Super Series final since the 2022 Cajun Classic.
Things improved for Van Koot as she built of an immediate break in the final and winners off her forehand and backhand helped her to her first set off Kamiji since taking the Japanese player to three sets in their French Riviera Open semi-final in June 2022.
However, Van Koot was only able to take one of the three opportunities to break throughout the remainder of the match, that coming at 5-0 down in the second set. She also held two break points in the final game, but Kamiji, who has become more accustomed to three set finals against Van Koot’s fellow Dutchwoman Diede de Groot in recent years, ultimately proved too consistent and forehand winners off two of the last three points brought the Japanese top seed first Super Series title since January 2020.
Like Oda, Kamiji left Iizuka with both singles and doubles titles, her flourishing partnership with South Africa’s Kgothatso Montjane bringing the top seeds their fourth Super Series title and second successive Japan Open title together after defeating Saki Takamuro and Van Koot 6-0 6-1 in the final.
Schroder's maiden Japan Open brings sixth Super Series title
A quad singles draw that saw Turkey’s Ahmet Kaplan beat two of the eight seeds to reach the semi-finals ended with world No. 2 Sam Schroder earning his third Super Series title of the 2024 season after defeating third seed Guy Sasson 6-1, 6-2.
Schroder ended Kaplan’s success 6-4 6-1 in the last four, but that’s also where world No.1 Niels Vink saw his Japan Open title defence come to an end against third seed Guy Sasson as Sasson repeated his Australian Open semi-final win over Vink, prevailing 3-6 6-2 6-2.
With Sasson having won his first match against Schroder at last year’s French Riviera Open, Schroder has not dropped a set to the Israeli since and he continued to dominate their head-to-head as he took the last five games of the opening set and the last four games of the second set.
A five-time Super Series champion before arriving in Iizuka, Schroder brought an end to a long sequence of deuces in the final game as he raced into the net to calmly put way a forehand winner of a backhand return to take his career tally of Super Series titles to six.
While it was a sixth Super Series singles title for Schroder, the quad doubles brought a first Super Series doubles title for the Australian-Canadian partnership of Heath Davidson and Robert Shaw.
Beaten by Schroder and Vink in last year’s final in Iizuka, as they have been in a total of five previous Super Series finals, Davidson and Shaw faced Andrew Bogdanov and David Wagner in this year’s final in Iizuka.
The USA duo were awarded a walkover ahead of their scheduled semi-final against tops seeds Schoder and Vink, but their first Super Series final together ended in a 6-2 6-2 victory for the more experienced partnership of Davidson and Shaw.
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