The men’s doubles final in Monastir had one point of difference from just about any other doubles match I’ve watched on the regular tours in recent times, and that was there was only one deuce. Not only that, it didn’t happen until the 19th game, but it proved to be the most vital game in the match.
Ajeet Rai held to love when he and left-hander Charlie Barry took on the Belarusian pair of Sergey Betov, who came out of retirement in May after six years away from the professional circuit, during which time he reached a career-high doubles ranking of 61, and Daniil Ostapenkov, who had beaten Rai in the first round of singles. Ostapenkov managed to hit three lets before double faulting to lose his second point, but he hit consecutive aces before hitting a forehand winner through the middle to end the game.
Rai hit a beautiful angled forehand volley to start Barry’s hold to love, and followed that with a fabulous cross-court backhand return into the tramlines to save Betov’s first game point. The first of two fantastic 12 shot rallies came on the final point, with Barry being forced to hit a forehand volley into the net. Betov hit a beautiful forehand return down the tramlines off Rai, but that wasn’t enough to stop the New Zealander holding serve.
There have been problems with the stream in every game I’ve watched from Monastir this week, and this match was no exception. Luckily the feed disappeared only for the first three points in the next game, with Ostapenkov acing Barry down the middle to continue the sequence of holds. Barry added three unreturnable serves as he won his game as well, and made his contribution to the highlights package when he hit a fabulous inside-out forehand return off Betov that was a candidate for shot of the match.
Rai and Ostapenkov then held to love, but things went wrong for the second seeds when Barry served next. Betov hit a fabulous backhand return down the line before forcing Barry to hit a forehand volley over the baseline. That gave the Belarusians a couple of break points, and Ostapenkov converted the first when he pulled an easy forehand winner into the tramlines to leave his partner serving for the set. He started and finished by forcing return errors, Rai’s backhand lob on the final point flying back over the baseline. The set had taken 49 minutes.
Rai hit a beautiful inside-out forehand winner into the tramlines on the way to holding serve in the opening game of the second set, with Ostapenkov then holding to love. The second of those fantastic 12 shot rallies came when Barry served next, but Ostapenkov’s fabulous cross-court forehand winner gave his team two break points. He was forced to hit a forehand into the net on the first, but Rai had the same thing happen to him to concede the break.
Betov hit a stunning angled forehand volley to finish a great short rally on his own second point, but he lost the third to a lovely backhand return down the tramlines from Barry. There were two more great rallies in the game, either side of a forced error from Rai, but Betov lost both of them with unforced forehand errors to give the break straight back. Barry added a beautiful forehand drop volley to the highlights when Rai held to love next up, and Ostapenkov held slightly less easily to level the scores.
As I wrote at the beginning, there was only one game that went to deuce, and that was when Barry served next. He had to save two break points after Betov hit a winning overhead volley, forcing the latter into a return error to save the first before Rai took them to deuce with a cross-court backhand volley. Barry missed his first serve on the deciding point, and Ostapenkov took full toll of his second by slamming a beautiful forehand return down the tramlines.
Betov then held to love to consolidate the break, and Rai lost just one point as the seeds fought to stay in the hunt. A forced return error from Rai off Ostapenkov took the score to 40-15, with the Belarusians having three Championship points. Betov overhit a backhand volley to lose the first, but forced Rai to hit a forehand into the net to convert the second. The match had lasted for an hour and 37 minutes, the final score being 7-5, 6-4.