Last year Matthew Shearer did something very few tennis players can manage: he won a professional title in his very first tournament outside his home country. This week he and Ozan Baris stepped out on court at Wichita State University in Kansas to defend their ITF doubles crown, facing the Australian pair of Charlie Camus and Pavle Marinkov in the final, Teenage left-hander Camus is back representing his home country after a couple of years playing under the French flag.
One of the few individual highlights in the first set was a fabulous backhand return down the tramlines by Shearer off Marinkov in the first game, but those two held comfortably before Camus stepped up for the first time. A double fault gave away a break point, which was saved by an easy cross-court forehand volley from Marinkov, and Baris was forced to hit a forehand into the net to lose the deciding point.
Baris the held as well to complete the first rotation, as did Marinkov, who then hit a stunning inside-out forehand return into the tramlines off Shearer. The latter added another terrific return, this time a backhand down the line off Camus after the left-hander had won the good rally on the previous point with a beautiful forehand winner down the right-hand tramline. Poor forehand volleys by Camus and Marinkov dropped them back to deuce, but Marinkov won the decider with a cross-court overhead volley to keep the sequence of holds intact.
Baris ended up at deuce as well after Shearer overcooked a forehand volley, but he aced Marinkov down the middle to win the deciding point. The latter then held to love before Baris added a beautiful cross-court forehand volley to the highlights package as Shearer went on to hold again. This time round Camus was able to hold to love, and that left Baris trying to do the same to take them to a tie-break.
Marinkov finished the great rally on the first point by hitting a gorgeous backhand winner down the tramlines, and Baris did the same on the second point before finishing the game with an unreturnable serve to Camus. The tie-break was a messy affair, with three mini-breaks in each of the first two groups of six points, and there was drama of a different kind as well.
Shearer lost his first point to a beautiful backhand return down the tramlines from Marinkov, but got that break back when forcing Marinkov to hit a forehand into the net on Camus’ first point. The left-hander double faulted to lose his second as well, and Baris hit a lovely backhand volley to consolidate his team’s advantage as they changed ends for the first time.
He lost his second point, though, to a fabulous backhand return down the tramlines from Camus, but Shearer put his team back in front with an easy forehand volley through the right-hand side of the court to take the second of Marinkov’s next pair of points. He then forced Marinkov into a return error to bring up a set point before the non-tennis drama happened.
Shearer had hit a fault on his first serve when Baris suddenly had a word with him and went and sat down. It took a couple of minutes for a physio to arrive, and a couple more before the American was ready to resume. Not surprisingly, the umpire didn’t allow the point to be replayed, so Shearer had only one chance to land a legal serve. He failed, and then got forced into a return error by Camus to level the scores as they swapped ends again.
Shearer was then forced into a backhand error to give the Australians their first set point, but Baris held firm to earn his team their second. An unreturnable serve and an ace down the middle to Baris from Marinkov gave the Australians a second set point, and Shearer hit an inside-out forehand volley wide before firing his racquet into the ground in disgust. The set had taken 58 minutes.
Shearer and Marinkov held safely to start the second set before Baris double faulted to drop back to deuce. A deciding point went to the receivers for the first time when Shearer was forced to leave a forehand volley short of the net, but he and Baris were given a chance to break straight back when Marinkov hit a forehand volley into the net to end a great rally. Camus saved that with another lovely forehand winner down the right-hand tramline, but he was forced to lob a backhand over the baseline to lose the deciding point.
After those hiccups there wasn’t another break point in the set, so it was simply a case of picking out the highlights before moving on to another tie-break. Camus’ second game saw a beautiful forehand return through the middle of the court from Baris and a fabulous forehand return down the left tramline from Shearer on the next point, while the best rally in the match came on the first point of Sherer’s third turn at the line.
It lasted for 15 shots before Baris smashed away the winning volley, and he hit the shot of the day on the very next point, a terrific reflex cross-court forehand volley when cramped up at the net. He had a proper medical time-out during the changeover at the end of that game, the physio working vigorously on his left leg, and he would give him more attention at the next changeover as well.
The second tie-break was rather more straightforward than the first until Marinkov sent a cross-court backhand volley wide on the last point before they changed ends. It got worse for the Australians when Camus lost his second point as well, to a fabulous forehand winner through the middle of the court from Baris, who then splatted away a forehand volley before Shearer completed the set after 50 minutes by acing Camus down the T.
Camus started the match tie-break with a winning forehand volley before a great return of serve from Marinkov forced Shearer to hit a forehand into the net. The New Zealander got the mini-break back when he hit a beautiful overhead forehand winner to end a good rally on Camus’ first point, and took Marinkov’s next point with a lovely forehand volley through the middle of the court.
That advantage disappeared when Camus hit a fabulous inside-out forehand return into the tramlines off Shearer, and he levelled the scores as they went to the second changeover with a lovely cross-court forehand winner. He lost his second point, though, when Marinkov was forced to hit a backhand wide at the end of a short rally. The latter was then forced into a return error by Baris, who won the good rally on his second point by steering a beautiful forehand winner into the left tramline.
That gave the defending champions three chances to retain their title, but an unreturnable serve from Marinkov to Shearer saved the first. They couldn’t do anything with the second, however, as Shearer wrapped up the victory after a marathon two hours and four minutes with a routine forehand volley at the net. The final score was 6-7 (8), 7-6 (2), 10-7.