Ajeet Rai and Tom Fancutt have won four tournaments together this year, but all of those have been ITF M25s. A Challenger final is a is quite a big jump, and they had done well to get that far in Plovdiv after beating the third seeds in the penultimate round. In this match they were up against the Dutch second seeds, Jarno Jans and Niels Visker, and it was somewhat of a surprise to see the Australasian pair break with their recent tradition by having Rai serve first.
He held safely to start before Jans held to love, but things didn’t go to plan when Fancutt served for the first time. A double fault was followed by the shot of the match, a terrific forehand return down the tramlines from Visker, and Fancutt lost the game when he hit a cross-court forehand over the baseline. They had a chance to break straight back when Visker overhit a forehand to concede the first deuce of the match, but a great serve to Rai on the deciding point saw his attempted forehand return go straight up in the air.
Jans hit a fabulous backhand return down the tramlines in the next game, but that was the only point Rai lost. He then hit a beautiful backhand lob down the left-hand side of the court off Jans, but the latter then aced Fancutt out wide before we saw what was by far the best rally in the match. It lasted for 18 shots before Fancutt was forced to hit a forehand into the net, but there was no pressure on the forehand that he bounced into the net to lose the game.
Fancutt and Visker both held to love before Rai had a slightly less straightforward hold, but the early break meant that Jans would now be serving for the set. One of the ball kids dropped a ball during the rally on the second point, and a great return from Rai forced Jans to hit a backhand into the net when the point was replayed, but the Dutchman picked up a couple of gears to finish the game with three unreturnable serves and an ace out wide to Rai. The set had taken 31 minutes.
Jans started the second set with a beautiful backhand return down the tramlines off Rai, but Fancutt closed out the game with a lovely backhand volley. Visker held to love before copying his partner by hitting a lovely backhand return down the tramlines, but that saved only the first game point before Rai smashed away the winning volley.
Visker ended a good short rally in the next game by hitting a forehand volley into the net to give away a deuce, but a great serve from Jans forced Rai’s forehand return of the deciding point to land in the net. We then saw a string of routine holds, and it wasn’t until Jans served again that there was another shot worthy of being added to the highlights package. That was a beautiful backhand volley into the tramline from Visker to end the game, and there were lovely backhand volleys from Jans and Fancutt in the next game before Rai held again.
Fancutt was annoyed with himself when he hit a cross-court forehand wide to give away a deuce in the next game, and was even more so when he was forced to hit a backhand volley into the net to lose a great rally on the deciding point. Not only did it give away a break, it meant that Jans would be serving for the title.
Visker smashed away lovely volleys either side of a double fault, with Fancutt then unlucky in that he couldn’t get his racquet out of the way in time as Jans hammered a ball down the left tramline that was not going to land anywhere near the court. It gave the Dutch pair three Championship points, and another great serve forced Fancutt to hit his backhand return into the net. The final score was 6-4, 7-5, and they had been on court for an hour and 17 minutes.