Joe Salisbury reigns supreme in Turin; Julian Cash lifts fifth Challenger title of the year
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Keep up-to-date with all the British tennis action across the ATP, WTA, ITF and wheelchair tours across the world, including six titles.
Salisbury and Ram crowned back-to-back champions in Turin
This week saw the return of the year-end championships at the Nitto ATP Finals in Turin, where Joe Salisbury and Rajeev Ram successfully defended their title.
The British, American duo finished the round-robin stage at the top of the Red Group, before going on to defeat Edouard Roger-Vasselin and Santiago Gonzalez 7-6(7), 3-6, 10-7 in the semi-finals.
Brimming with confidence going into the championship match, Salisbury and Ram dispatched Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos 6-3, 6-4 to secure the title and extend their match winning streak at the tournament to 10 matches.
The pair have become the first doubles duo to clinch successive titles at the Nitto ATP Finals since 2017, as they ound off another successful year ranked world No.3’s in the ATP rankings.
Cash and Samuel seal silverware on Challenger Tour
There’s just no stopping Julian Cash, who has picked up yet another title on the ATP Challenger tour, after partnering Bart Stevens at the Danderyd Challenger in what was the Brit's sixth final in a row.
This marked the British, Dutch duo’s first tournament together but that certainly didn’t show as they raced to the final without dropping a set. Facing India’s Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan and Vijay Sundar Prashanth, Cash and Stevens came back from a set down to eventually see out the match in a 6-7(7), 6-4, 10-7 victory.
Cash’s sensational form and consistency on the ATP and Challenger tours has seen him ascend to a career-high ranking of world No.47.
Meanwhile in Canada, Toby Samuel teamed up with Sweden’s Andre Goransson for the Drummondville Challenger. The pair were in virtually unstoppable form all week, dropping just one set en route to the title.
In a closely fought final, they took down British, Canadian duo Giles Hussey and Liam Draxl, 6-7(2), 6-3, 10-8 to lift the trophy – marking Samuel’s biggest title of his career to date.
Haul of Brits reach finals across ITF tour
Moving on to Luxembourg, we saw an all-British duo lift the silverware, as Alicia Barnett and Sam Murray Sharan joined forces for the W40 Petange event.
The British pair eased through the opening rounds before setting up a final clash against fellow Brit and 'Beyond the Baseline' star, Ali Collins and Isabelle Haverlag, which saw Barnett and Murray Sharan take the edge in the match deciding tie-break to prevail 6-7(4), 6-1, 10-6.
British No.3 Harriet Dart headed to the W100 Takasaki event in Japan where she enjoyed a strong run to the final. Dart battled against China's Yue Yuan in the final showdown but just missed out on the crown in a 5-7, 7-5, 6-0 defeat.
Meanwhile, Johannus Monday and Shunsuke Mitsui finished their campaign at the M25 Columbus as runners-up in the men’s doubles draw. The pair lost out in the second set tie-breaker to all-American duo Robert Cash and Bryce Nakashima, 7-5, 7-6(10).
Emily Webley-Smith and Sofia Shapatava also ended their week in Italy as runners-up at the W25 Solarino, after missing out on the title to Angelica Moratelli and Lisa Pigato, 6-3, 6-4.
Meanwhile, Jacob Fearnley was forced to retire after two games in his final match against Learner Tien at the M25 Columbus event, leading the 22-year-old to finish the tournament as runner-up.
Slade shines at Open Paratennis du Loiret
Greg Slade produced the outstanding results of the week among the Brits on the ITF Wheelchair Tennis Tour after the British No.2 lifted both the quad singles and quad doubles titles at the Open Paratennis du Loiret in France.
Playing his first tournament since making his Wimbledon debut in July, after recovering from a wrist injury, Slade claimed the first ITF 2 singles title of his career after back-to-back straight sets wins over Frenchman Justin Michel and second seed Ahmet Kaplan of Turkey. Slade then beat Turkey’s Ugur Altinel for the first time in four career matches, fighting back strongly from a set down to earn a 4-6, 6-1, 6-2 victory.
Finalists at February’s Bolton Indoor ITF 3, Slade and Germany’s Marcus Laudan collected their first title together in the quad doubles after beating the top two seeded partnerships, defeating Altinel and Kaplan 7-5, 6-2 in the final.
Lucy Shuker ended the tournament as runner-up in the women’s doubles draw after narrowly missing out on retaining the title she won last year with the USA’s Dana Mathewson.
Shuker and Frenchwoman Pauline Deroulede reached this year’s final for the loss of just three games, but then missed out 6-3, 6-4 to Jinliang Huang and Xiaohui Li. Shuker was a quarter-finalist in the women’s singles after the British No.1 and British No.2 Cornelia Oosthuizen both lost out to Switzerland’s Nalani Buob.
