With 49 doubles pairs and 118 players across all classes in the singles the 1st Paris Open has now finished. A big thank you to all the players for coming and for being able to deal with the very hot weather that we experienced over the whole weekend!
Elite Doubles Classes
Izzy Bramhall (GB) & Nicole Eisler (Swiss) totally dominated the women’s doubles, winning all their matches by large margins and Nicole went on to win a second doubles title with another Brit, Dan Busby, as they also dominated the Mixed Elite class against the 3 other all French pairs.
Morten Jaksland (Den) & Mohammed Tarik Koubaa (Mor) combined in the Men’s Elite Doubles and although they were pushed close by French pair Cedric Junillon & Arnaud Genin in the final, their superior touch and feel led them to a +8 win.
Finally an unexpected win (“of Agincourt proportions”) for the British pair of Bispham & Bishop over the much fancied French pair of Cencig & Montagnon saw the Brits take their first ever Elite Doubles podium spot.
Elite Singles
Izzy Bramhall continued her very busy comeback with an impressive performance in the Women’s singles beating her doubles partner Nicole Eisler +21 and then winning the final against new top ten player Anastasiya Bruzgina from Belarus, 21-6 / 7-21 / 21-7 / 9-8 for a +16 win. Izzy will very soon be re-entering the Women’s Top Ten!
The top 4 seeds all reached the semi finals which saw Morten take out the last French hope, Cedric Junillon +13, whilst Dan Busby wasn’t able to get his revenge on Kresten Hougaard (after his loss at the King of Rackets), as Kresten was forced to pull out injured before their match.
Jaksland dominated the final against Busby, comfortably winning the first two sports 21-14, 21-13 which put the Dane in complete control of the match. An impressive performance in the squash to get 15 points left just 13 points needed in the tennis (Jaksland’s’s strong sport) which he reached with the scores at 13-6 to record a +16 victory and his 3rd World Tour title in a row.
Great Atmosphere All Weekend
It has been another weekend with lots of competition on court but always with a lot of respect between the players and the BBQ on Saturday night was followed by the players hitting the dancefloor in the centre of Paris!
A huge thank you to all the volunteers and to all the players for making this first Challenger tournament in Paris such a success. Please check out the 3 videos of the weekend from our official partner SBAM
Next year we plan to stage an IWT tournament which we are already looking forward to. The date is still to be confirmed.
Joss Gadé & Simon Puthoste / Tournament Directors
& Duncan Stahl / FIR General Secretary
Photo Credit: Jack Bishop
