Otto Virtanen and Benjamin Bonzi met in a fantastic Brest final with both players having lots at stake – Virtanen has a chance to break the top 100 and Bonzi was going for a third titles in as many weeks. Taro Daniel and Rinky Hijikata made important moves in terms of their chances at securing Australian Open main draw spots, while Borna Gojo returned to form after an injury-plagued season. Here’s a look back at last week’s action:
ATP Tour Challenger Weekly Recap
Taipei
After all his Challenger Tour domination during the first half of the season, Adam Walton bounced off the main tour a bit and still had to put some work in to ensure a top 100 finish. Coming off solid runs in Hangzhou and Shenzhen, the Australian once again made it into the quarterfinals to avenge his defeat to Mackenzie McDonald from the week before. To make his sixth final of 2024, the 25-year-old still had to eliminate the top-seeded Aleksandar Vukic and managed that in three sets.
Daniel started the year with his second ATP Tour final in Auckland, but then his form completely fell apart. Now the Japanese had to pull off exactly what he did in 2023, which is finish strong in the Challengers to secure his top 100 spot and Australian Open main draw. The second seed in Taipei was able to find his way to the final with just one tie-break set played on the way (against Alafia Ayeni). In the quarterfinals, he defeated Coleman Wong in a rematch of their epic Playford clash from 2023.
It’s a slightly uncomfortable matchup for both with neither player feeling that comfortable on the attack. But after some early misses, it was Daniel who was always in front and was a tiny bit better at taking care of these mid-court opportunities. Walton kept pushing for it though and had his chances in the second set, including a 0-40 at 4-3 and then 15-40 in the last game. But Daniel took his ninth Challenger title 6-4 7-5 and while he likely needs a bit more to finish top 100, he’s really increased his chances. He’ll play Seoul next, while Walton takes the week off and wraps up his season with US Challengers in November.
Brest
Bonzi won back-to-back titles in Roanne and Saint-Brieuc and was hoping to claim three trophies in three weeks now, just like he did in 2021 (Saint-Tropez, Cassis, Rennes). Getting to the final took a lot out of him with another three-set win over Pierre-Hugues Herbert (until that point the only player to have taken a set off him during this run, in both encounters) and then more thrillers with Joao Fonseca and especially Alibek Kachmazov (came back from 6-7 0-3 and saved one match points).
Virtanen usually excels at the indoor Challengers in Europe and he likely needed one title towards the end of the season to break the top 100 and secure Australian Open main draw. The Finn was in trouble in the opening round against Arthur Gea and had to dig deep to find his discipline off the ground. But once he did, he was able to take that match from a set down and start playing a lot better as the week went on, straight-setting Matteo Martineau, Luca Van Assche, and Benjamin Hassan.
Virtanen seemed like he might have things under control after the opener, but went down an early break in the next two and couldn’t recover it in time. That is until Bonzi missed 2 match points at 5-4 in the third and suddenly the Finn was right back in it. Despite having to withstand one more chance for the Frenchman to claim the trophy, that middle ground in Virtanen’s game he’s got this year was crucial. He was more consistent in all the key moments and took his sixth Challenger Tour title 6-4 4-6 7-6(6), securing his top 100 debut and improving the final record to 6-0. He plays Bratislava this week, while Bonzi had to pull out of that event’s qualifying draw.
Curitiba
Jaime Faria flew to Brazil for a couple of weeks after his runner-up finish in Valencia and had no chance to beat Hugo Dellien in Campinas, especially given the short turnaround. The Portuguese proved that with an easier draw he was capable of more, defeating local favorites Matheus Pucinelli de Almeida and Gustavo Heide to make another Challenger Tour final. The quarterfinals had him clashing against his veteran compatriot Gastao Elias and Faria had to fight back from a set down in his toughest match of the week.
Felipe Meligeni Alves beat Faria in the final round of qualifying at Roland Garros, but went a bit quiet once he returned to South America with two wins in the last three events. The Brazilian is a strong altitude player though and it didn’t take him long to fire up again. Last week’s Campinas runner-up Juan Pablo Ficovich was already a good win in these conditions and he managed to crush Juan Manuel Cerundolo in the semifinals to make his first final of 2024.
This was a very different match to their clash in Paris. Faria was serving great and utilizing the altitude conditions better than Meligeni Alves, also staying on top of most rallies. Despite the home crowd support, the Brazilian would very often have to stretch for balls on the back foot. Faria’s performance was pretty clinical as he claimed his second Challenger title 6-4 6-4 and is now about 100 points away from the top 100. He’ll go back to Europe and play in the Portuguese National Championships next, while Meligeni Alves takes the week off before returning in Lima.
Playford
Hijikata had appeared in six Challenger Tour events before Playford in 2024, not getting past the quarterfinals. But the 2022 champion was motivated to ensure his top 100 finish and despite facing adversity from the get-go, was able to deliver this time. In the quarterfinals, he had to snap the 29-match win streak of Omar Jasika and came back from a set down, repeating the same feat to beat Masamachi Imamura in the final four and improving his all-time Playford record to 12-1.
Embed from Getty Images
As usual in the Australian Challengers (besides the ones before the Australian Open), the draw was heavily comprised of players from two nations – the home country of the event and Japan. It was fitting then that Hijikata squared off against Yuta Shimizu in the final. The 25-year-old snapped a 4-match losing streak and won his first four matches without dropping a set, impressing in dominant wins over Li Tu and Marc Polmans. Only Yuki Mochizuki took him to a tie-break.
Once again things weren’t all that easy for Hijikata, but he took the opening set and got the second to a tie-break. Aggression doesn’t always come to him naturally, and he was leaving Shimizu plenty of space to execute his game. But from 1-4 down in the breaker, the Australian found that turbo mode he can sometimes turn on which has him sprinting around the court and being impossible to hit through. Hijikata took the last 6 points of the match to claim his third Challenger Tour title 6-4 7-6(4), all in Australia (2022, 2024 Playford, 2023 Burnie). His top 100 finish is now secured, but both finalists will still be in Sydney this week.
Sioux Falls
University of Arizona’s Colton Smith impressed in a few of his professional appearances this summer, especially with a streak of three ITF finals (won one title) and a recent Challenger quarterfinal in Tiburon. He started his run in Sioux Falls by clutching out a win against Martin Damm and kept going exactly in that manner, surviving a lot of break points in the decider against Ozan Baris and coming back from 2-5 down in the third set to beat Murphy Cassone.
Borna Gojo was out for seven months with an injury this year and only started picking up wins sporadically before Sioux Falls. You could see he was starting to get better in the qualifying though and even drawing the second seed Mitchell Krueger in main draw round one wasn’t scary for the Croat. His confidence was back with aggression in the key moments against Denis Kudla or Brandon Holt as Gojo found his game again. Six wins later he made it to his first final since April 2023.
When Gojo had his chances to go 6-1 5-2 up, it seemed like this final would be just a victory lap. But Smith had other plans and was able to claw his way back into the second set. As it turned out that was only temporary though and the Croat responded again, taking his second Challenger title 6-1 7-5 to really get the comeback going. Both finalists grabbed special exempt spots for Charlottesville this week and got placed in separate halves of the draw again.
Events held this week:
- Slovak Open 2024 (Bratislava, Challenger 125, indoor hard)
- SISLEY Seoul Open (Challenger 100, hard)
- Jonathan Fried Pro Challenger (Charlottesville, Challenger 75, hard)
- Challenger Ciudad de Guayaquil (Challenger 75, clay)
- NSW Open (Sydney, Challenger 75, hard)
- Brazzaville Challenger (Challenger 50, clay)
Top 100 players in action:
- Roman Safiullin, Gabriel Diallo, Marton Fucsovics, Jacob Fearnley, Otto Virtanen + Thiago Monteiro, Aleksandar Kovacevic in qualifying (Bratislava)
- Taro Daniel (Seoul)
- Francisco Comesana (Guayaquil)
- Rinky Hijikata, Thanasi Kokkinakis (Sydney)
First-round matches to watch:
Bratislava
- (3) Marton Fucsovics vs Kei Nishikori
- Otto Virtanen vs Lukas Klein
- Maximilian Marterer vs (WC) Stan Wawrinka
Wawrinka will play his first hard-court Challenger since February 2005 (in recent years he appeared in clay events at 2020 Prague-1, Prague-2, 2022 Marbella, 2023 Aix-en-Provence, and 2023-24 Bordeaux).
Seoul
- (1) Taro Daniel vs Benoit Paire
- (7) Terence Atmane vs Nikoloz Basilashvili
Charlottesville
- Nishesh Basavareddy vs Eliot Spizzirri
- (7) Dmitry Popko vs (WC) Reilly Opelka
- Beibit Zhukayev vs (2) Learner Tien
Guayaquil
- Tomas Barrios Vera vs (3) Daniel Elahi Galan
- Juan Pablo Varillas vs Ignacio Buse
Sydney
- Masamichi Imamura vs (WC) Hayden Jones
- Matthew Delavedova vs (7) Shintaro Mochizuki
Brazzaville
- Guy Orly Iradukunda vs (7) Eliakim Coulibaly
- Alec Beckley vs (2) Santiago Rodriguez Taverna
Main photo credit: Jerry Lai-USA TODAY Sports