Sasson, Oda, De Groot add French Riviera Open to Roland Garros titles
Guy Sasson added his name to the illustrious list of Super Series singles champions on the UNIQLO Wheelchair Tennis Tour as he joined Tokito Oda and Diede de Groot in lifting the 2024 French Riviera Open quad singles, men’s singles and women’s singles titles just seven days on from the same trio securing Grand Slam success at Roland Garros.
On a day when all three singles finals on centre Court at the Mouratoglou Tennis Academy in Biot were won within a two minute window, Sasson needed just an hour and 33 minutes to beat sixth seed Ahmet Kaplan of Turkey 6-3 6-2 in the first Super Series quad singles final of the year to feature neither of the world’s top two ranked players, Sam Schroder nor Niels Vink.
With 22-year-old Kaplan having beaten top seed Vink in three sets in the semi-finals to reach his first Super Series singles final, he took out the player that had beaten Sasson to the title in Biot 12 month ago and subsequently moves up one place to a new career-best at world No.6 this week.
Sasson was intent on not finishing runners-up again and raced to a 4-0 lead before Kaplan narrowly avoided going 5-0 down and earned back-to-back games. However, successive forehand and backhand errors off the Turkish player’s racket gave Sasson the opening set and he earned a two-game cushion at 4-2 in the second set, Kaplan ultimately missing his mark with a backhand on match point.
“After last week, winning Roland Garros and coming here, it’s not easy to keep competing at such a high level and maintain the focus. But I’m happy that I was able to do it,” said Sasson. “It’s been a great tournament, as always. Coming back here (after reaching the final last year) I knew I wanted to do something different this time and go for the title. It’s not supposed to be easy, there are great players here and Ahmet is a great player. It was a great fight and I’m happy that I was able to pull it off.”
While bowing out of the quad singles against Kaplan, there was better news for Vink in the quad doubles as his first ever tournament partnering Britain's Andy Lapthorne ended in a 6-7(1)
6-2 (12-10) victory over Heath Davidson and Kaplan.
After recovering from 6-1 down and then three match points down in the final match tie-break against Davidson and Kaplan, Vink's second doubles title in as many weeks has earned the Dutchman a return to the quad doubles world No. 1 ranking, above his countryman and regular partner Schroder, who recently replaced Vink at the top of the quad singles rankings.
Oda earns return to top spot after first French Riviera Open title
Oda arrived in Biot just 29 points shy of Alfie Hewett at the top of the men’s singles world rankings but returns to Japan having regained the world No. 1 ranking and with further clay court success in France later this year at the forefront of his mind.
The sixth Super Series final between top seed Hewett and second seed Oda saw the Briton twice serve for the opening set after taking a commanding 5-2 lead, but he was unable to capitalise on his advantage and a set point in the eighth game and it was Oda who wrestled the set away.
Hewett’s fifth double fault of the final gave Oda a 2-0 second set lead and the 18-year-old soon doubled his lead before Hewett managed back-to-back games. However, while Hewett’s error count crept up at crucial stages, Oda’s tally of winner and aces increased as he opened up a 5-2 lead. In all, Hewett saved five match points, but it was Oda’s sixth ace of the final that wrapped up a 7-5 6-3 victory and his fifth Super Series title after an hour and 31 minutes.
“The is my first time to win the title here, so I am so happy to win,” said Oda. “It’s been such a hard two weeks, but my conditioning is always good. I am so happy to come back to number one in the world. It’s a very good result looking ahead to the Paralympic Games and I hope for one more big win on the clay courts. This tournament and last week (at Roland Garros) I played really well so I hope to keep going.“
With the Paris 2024 Paralympics now just a little over 70 days away, there was encouraging news for Netherlands in the men's doubles as Tom Egberink and Maikel Scheffers claimed their second Super Series title as a partnership some 12 years after their first, after beating Ruben Spaargaren and Maarten Ter Hofte 6-1 6-4 in an all-Dutch final. Both sets of Dutch finalists beat one of the top two seeded partnerships in straight sets in the semi-finals.
De Groot seals fifth French Riviera Open title
A lot has happened since Diede de Groot and Yui Kamiji’s first meeting of 2024 came in the first Super Series women’s singles final of the year at the Melbourne Open, where Kamiji had a match point against De Groot and threatened to end what was then a 130-match winning stream for the Dutch world No. 1.
For one, De Groot’s winning streak came to an end at 145 matches during the World Team Cup final in May, an event that Kamij missed due to illness, while they had differing fortunes at Roland Garros, where Kamiji went out of the women’s singles in the quarter-finals.
However, the 20th Super Series singles final between the world No. 1 and world No. 2 proved every bit as intriguing as any match between the two players in recent seasons, with Kamiji maintaining a narrow lead until De Groot’s second ace of the match saw her edge ahead 5-4.
It was an advantage that De Groot would keep as she slotted a backhand past Kamiji to seal the opening set.
Kamiji twice had game points to open up a 2-0 second set lead but was unable to take her chances and while both players put together back-to-back games later in the set, some untimely double faults deep into the set proved costly for Kamiji and De Groot delivered one final backhand winner to earn her a fifth French Riviera Open title.
“! feel very good. I’m very happy to win, of course, but I’m mainly happy with my preparation for Paris (the Paralympics),” De Groot told the assembled media afterwards. “We now have a little break for the grass, but after that it’s all clay, so it’s good preparation.
“I think there are some improvements in my game (still to make), but still, I’m so happy with two weeks and four titles.”
“My mindset is very simple. You just have to work really, really, really hard but there are no secrets. Just try to be your best. I think many players want to be in my position but not all players realise that there is also a lot of pressure with always winning, but the main thing (for me) is to focus on myself.”
As the success of Chinese women's players continues to build and build this season, the latest Netherlands-China, P.R. meeting came in the women's doubles final in Biot, with De Groot and Aniek van Koot earning their latest Super Series title together after defeating Li Xiaohui and Zhu Zhenzhen 6-2 6-3.