Doubles Masters: Buis and van Koot celebrate at home

Marjolein Buis and Aniek van Koot avenged the round-robin loss to Louise Hunt and Dana Mathewson by beating them 6-3, 6-1 in the women’s final of the wheelchair tennis Doubles Masters in Bemmel, Netherlands, on Sunday (18 November).

Both teams exchanged breaks in the first four games, but thereafter the Dutch second seeds gained control and moved 4-2 ahead before closing out the first set.

Hunt and Mathewson struck first in the second set, but a sequence of six game in succession earned Buis her second successive Doubles Masters title.

For van Koot it was a fourth Doubles Masters title with a third different partner.

“I think it was a really good match. In the group phase we faced each other well and that match did not go well for us and we did not reach our level, but today we really did,” said van Koot.

“We had a really good plan and it worked out. We decided what speed we wanted to play the rallies and we created the pressure and we didn’t wait for the pressure.

“It’s amazing. It doesn’t matter what match it is, it’s always awesome to win in your own country and with family and friends here.”

Buis also celebrated the fact that the players are rarely at home during the season.

“We played our own game today instead of responding to their game and their strokes. It’s really nice to share a victory like this with family and friends and to show them what we are doing all year round and why we are away 20 weeks of the year and missing birthdays and other occasions,” she said.

Diede de Groot and Lucy Shuker, the 2016 champions, finished third after beating Germany’s Katharina Kruger and Michaela Spaanstra of the Netherlands 6-0, 6-1.

Second title in three years for French duo

Top seeds Stephane Houdet and Nicolas Peifer beat Wimbledon finalists and reigning British Open champions Joachim Gerard and Stefan Olsson after two hours and 37 minutes to claim the men’s Doubles Masters title.

The Belgian-Swedish duo dropped just the sixth game of the opening set.

However, Houdet and Peifer created more pressure in the second set and established a 5-2 lead before forcing the deciding set.

The French couple fought back from 5-2 down and survived a match point against them at 5-4 to force a final tiebreak.

The reigning Australian Open and Roland Garros champions took their momentum into the tiebreak, building a commanding 5-0 lead.

It was a deficit from which Gerard and Olsson were never able to recover and 2016 champions Houdet and Peifer regained the year-end doubles championship title with a 1-6, 6-4, 7-6 (3) victory.

After back-to-back losses in their last round-robin pool match and their semi-final, second seeds Gustavo Fernandez and Gordon Reid finished their tournament on a winning note, beating Japan’s Shingo Kunieda and Takashi Sanada 6-1, 6-7 (6), 6-2 in the third place play-off.