Portuguese tennis player Jaime Faria, 390th in the ATP rankings, was in the spotlight yesterday on the penultimate day of the Vila Real de Santo António International Tennis Open, by guaranteeing his presence in the singles final and by winning the doubles title, in partnership with João Dominguez.
The 20-year-old Lisbon native will try to win his third individual title on the professional circuit today, in a game scheduled for 14pm, with Dutchman Jelie Sels (00th)
Faria started yesterday facing the North American Nathan Ponwith (606th), «in one of the meetings of the week in which he was most dominant. The athlete from the High Performance Center of the Portuguese Tennis Federation had to recover from 0-3 in the opening set, but, after winning seven consecutive games, he took the lead – confirmed with a break to 3-1 that sentenced the match, concluded with the partials of 6-3, 6-1", according to the race organizers.
«He started the game very well, but I knew how to react, I showed good intensity, I tried to get to the point and I started to be more aggressive at the beginning of the game. From the moment I was able to respond and serve a little better, I entered the game more easily and had more opportunities to dismantle his game from deep in the field. I feel like it was the best singles game of the week,” said Faria.
«I'm going to have a few more hours on the field, which gives me good feelings, because I've been winning, I have more rhythm and I feel the shots better. I saw him play last week with Henrique [Rocha], he is a dangerous player, he makes a lot of variations and he is feeling very good on these courts, but I will certainly be at 200% for the final", assured the tennis player Portuguese.
Sels had a double journey, albeit a short one, as he had to finish, in less than an hour, the quarter-final with the Russian Yaroslav Demin (817th) – interrupted at 1-1 in the second set –, which ended up win 7-6 (8/6), 6-2. Shortly afterwards, Sels returned to the court to defeat Norwegian Viktor Durasovic (411th), with a double 6-2, in 72 minutes.
Soon after, Jaime Faria and João Domingues played in the doubles semi-final, where they eliminated, by 6-3, 7-6 (7/2), the Luxembourgish Raphael Calzi and the Brazilian João Eduardo Schiessl (doubles champion of the 3 .º Open, on Sunday). Less than an hour later, the Portuguese duo competed in the final with the number 1 seeds, the Australian Thomas Fancutt and the North American Hunter Reese, whom they managed to prevail against in two tie-breaks: 7-6 (7 /2), 7-6 (7/2).
«We managed to take the rhythm from the semi-final to the final. We are understanding each other better and better and this first title together is quite special», highlighted Faria.
The Domingues/Faria partnership will continue over the next few weeks in the tournaments that will take place in the Algarve.
«We improved a lot from last week to this, although we reached the semi-finals, but we have played good games. We both have good moments during the games and the most difficult thing in pairs is balancing these moments between the two", said Domingues, who made a point of explaining the secret of success: "We have a great friendship off the field. I like him a lot and I hope he wins tomorrow.”
The 4th Vila Real de Santo António International Tennis Open is an event of the ITF World Tennis Tour, organized with the support of the Vila Real de Santo António City Council and distributes a total prize money of 25 thousand dollars.
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