Damir Dzumhur kept up his perfect record in finals in 2024 to deny Francesco Passaro his Top 100 debut. Meanwhile, this year’s Australian Open boys’ singles champion, Rei Sakamoto, surprised everybody by getting the title in Yokkaichi. But these stories had nothing on Hady Habib’s unbelievable win in the Temuco final. Read up on the last week of the 2024 ATP Challenger Tour season:
Challenger Tour Weekly Recap
Maia
Francesco Passaro had a last-minute opportunity to break the Top 100 this year, but only if he won the title in Maia. That seemed pretty tricky, considering he missed two months with an injury and tanked the third set of his first match since then in Montemar the week before. But despite going down a set to Vilius Gaubas and Andrej Martin, the Italian eventually secured his chance to play for that achievement in one of the final matches of the 2024 ATP Challenger Tour season.
Damir Dzumhur secured his Top 100 finish by making the Maia final, mostly thanks to going 5-0 in championship matches over the entire season (Barletta, Zagreb, Ostrava, Santo Domingo, Istanbul). The Bosnian hadn’t posted consecutive wins at one event since that last title, but survived a thriller against Frederico Ferreira Silva in the opening round to kick off his run. The key performance was defeating Federico Coria in the semifinals, a match that secured him his Australian Open main draw spot.
Passaro needed that one more win to get the Top 100 and Dzumhur showed him right away it was going to be tough. The Bosnian’s spectacular defense and court craft were making it tough for his opponent to wrap up points, even if he did have his share of massive forehands. Eventually it was yet another final masterclass as Dzumhur claimed his 14th Challenger title 6-3 6-4. He matched the achievements of Sebastian Baez (2021), Facundo Bagnis (2016), Benjamin Bonzi (2021), Juan Ignacio Chela (2001), and Younes el Aynaoui (1998) with only Tallon Griekspoor winning more trophies at this level (8 in 2021) in a single season. Both finalists wrapped up their 2024 campaigns.
Temuco
Camilo Ugo Carabelli produced a very strong finish to the season with six consecutive quarterfinals. By reaching the championship match in Temuco, he was able to secure his spot in the Top 100 at the end of the year. In his first hard-court Challenger since April 2022 in Salinas, he was able to deliver some high-quality performances and saved one match point to beat Tomas Barrios Vera in the quarterfinals (the home crowd favorite netted a relatively easy mid-court forehand).
Hady Habib was in incredible form on his serve in Temuco, posting over 10 aces in each of his first four matches. That included a truly ridiculous performance against Joao Lucas Reis da Silva as he blasted 18 aces in just 40 service points and only dropped four points on his delivery in total. The Lebanese made his maiden Challenger final in Santos in May (lost to Alejo Lorenzo Lingua Lavallen), securing another shot at the end of the season in Temuco.
Habib looked fully in control until serving for the match at 6-4 5-4 40-30, Ugo Carabelli pretty lethargic and seemingly satisfied with his Top 100 finish. Saving the match point woke up the beast in the Argentinian and turned this encounter into an unbelievable classic. Habib went down 0-2 in the deciding set, but kept fighting despite his serving losing so much bite later on. He pushed for it and eventually claimed his 1st Challenger title 6-4 6-7(3) 7-6(2), becoming the first Lebanese player to triumph at this level and securing his Australian Open qualifying spot. Both players finished their seasons.
Yokkaichi
2024 Australian Open boys’ singles champion Rei Sakamoto is in the middle of his Challenger breakthrough with already a quarterfinal appearance in Yokohama coming into this week. Handed a pretty nice draw in Yokkaichi, the 18-year-old did well to make the semifinals without dropping a set. It was only Shintaro Mochizuki that ended up being an issue for the youngster, who fended him off to keep his run going and reach another milestone.
Christoph Negritu had only played one Challenger main draw match before August 2024, finding himself in the form of his late of late. He had a couple of tight losses to Constant Lestienne (in one of them he had seven match points), finally getting a win of that quality against No. 2 seed Mattia Bellucci here. The German qualifier went on to reach his 1st Challenger semifinal and final, saving one match point against Philip Sekulic when the Australian injured himself up 6-5 40-30 on serve in the deciding set.
Sakamoto seemed pretty banged up after all his efforts this week as he dropped the opening set 1-6. But the Japanese teenager wasn’t going to go down without a fight and started turning the match around. In the next two sets he never faced a break point, ramping up the pace to get the key advantage at 4-all in the decider and pick up his 1st Challenger title 1-6 6-3 6-4. Both finalists have already ended their seasons – Sakamoto on a Top 500 debut, Negritu with the same achievement in the Top 400.
Manzanillo
Mats Rosenkranz hadn’t reached a Challenger semifinal since beating three Top 120 opponents to get to that stage in Mouilleron-le-Captif in 2021, but brought some very good form to the Mexican Challenger 50 double with a quarterfinal in Puerto Vallarta already. The German serve-and-volleyer defeated home crowd favorite Rodrigo Pacheco Mendez in the second round before taking down last week’s runner-up Liam Draxl in the semifinals.
Gonzalo Oliveira recently picked up his maiden Challenger title in Brazzaville and found more success at another event of his category (Challenger 50 in Manzanillo). Making the final put him in a position to fight for an Australian Open qualifying spot with only Felix Corwin taking a set off him in the first four matches. Oliveira demolished Dimitar Kuzmanov in the quarterfinals and took down recent Drummondville champion Aidan Mayo in the final four.
The last Challenger final of the season ended up being a very clean performance from Rosenkranz. While Oliveira outaced him, it still felt like the German’s serve was doing a lot more damage with better angles and spot-serving. Off the ground he was also more consistent with the Venezuelan sometimes hitting sloppy errors and not being able to find more margin in longer exchanges. Rosenkranz picked up his 1st Challenger title 6-3 6-4 and will jump over 100 spots in the rankings. He ends his season while Oliveira hopes to secure an Australian Open qualifying spot as the top seed at an M15 event in South Africa.
No Challenger Tour events will be held next week as the tour heads for a short break before returning in 2025.
Main Photo Credit: Robert Deutsch – USA TODAY Sports
