Tennis
Sumit Nagal wins Tampere Open for his 2nd ATP Challenger title of the year
This victory marked Nagal's fourth career ATP Challenger title. This is, meanwhile, his second title of the year, as he previously clinched the Garden Open in Rome back in April.
FILE PHOTO: Sumit Nagal won the Chennai Open ATP Challenger Tour title in February.
Indian tennis player Sumit Nagal beat Dalibor Svrcina of the Czech Republic in straight sets to clinch the Tampere Open title in Tampere, Finland, on Sunday. Nagal displayed his prowess on the court, triumphing over Svrcina with a scoreline of 6-4, 7-5.
This victory marked Nagal's fourth career ATP Challenger title in five outings. This is, meanwhile, his second title of the year, as he previously clinched the Garden Open in Rome back in April.
Nagal started off the event with a 6-4, 6-1 win over former world No 35 Jiri Vesely in the first round before beating Brazil’s Joao Lucas Reis Da Silva 6-3, 6-7(2), 7-6(4) in the second round. In the quarterfinal, he scored a 6-3, 6-3 win over Tunisia’s Aziz Dougaz and then in the semifinal, he beat Spain’s Daniel Rincon 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 to make it to the final.
In the final, Nagal got off to a shaky start, losing his first serve game as Svrcina raced to a 3-0 lead and extended it to 4-1.
However, the Indian immediately regained his composure and broke back successively on three instances to send the Czech onto the backfoot, as the seventh-seeded Indian seized the opening set 6-4, thanks to some great play from the baseline.
Having shown composure in the latter stages of the opening set, Nagal started positively in the following set and broke Svrcina to race to a 4-1 lead. However, the fifth-seed Czech used his smartness and instantly broke back to have things back on serve.
The break wasn't enough to trouble Nagal, as he upped his ante and re-broke Svrcina, eventually taking a 5-3 lead. Svrcine was in no mood to go down without a fight and engaged in some brutal exchange of shots during the Indian's serve and broke back again for a glimmer of hope to take the match to the decider.
At 5-5, Nagal broke Svrcine yet again, leading 6-5. Serving it out for the championship, the Czech engaged in some last-gasp power-hitting and saved three match points. Finally, he fell in the fourth match point, as the Indian closed the contest in an hour and 44 minutes.
This title win in Finland is expected to take him from the current world rank No. 231 rank to 175 when the standings are updated on Monday.
