Genova Premier Padel P2, Chingotto-Galan domination. Ortega-Araujo, the comeback is fabulous

The fifth title of the season for Fede Chingotto and Ale Galan, the first as a pair for Marta Ortega and Sofia Araujo. On a splendid sunday of padel at the Valletta Cambiaso Park (second consecutive sell-out after yesterday’s semifinals), the number 1 seeded players on the two Genova Premier Padel P2 draw lists fell in the final: first Paula Josemaria and Ari Sanchez, defeated 6-3 7-6 by Ortega (who had already won a Premier Padel title, last year in Rome paired with Gemma Triay) and Araujo (at her first ever title), then Arturo Coello and Agustin Tapia, beaten with a double 6-1 in 45 minutes in the least balanced of the eight head to head played this season. For Chingotto and Galan alone, therefore, it was an Italian double, with the P2 in Genoa won after the BNL Italy Major Premier Padel and adding to the titles in Brussels, Sevilla and Mar del Plata. The awards were presented by the President of the International Padel Federation Luigi Carraro, the President of the Liguria Regional Committee of the FITP Andrea Fossati, the FITP National Councillor Roberta Righetto, the Liguria Region’s Councillor for Sport and Youth Policies Simona Ferro and the Councillor for Sport and Tourism of the Municipality of Genova Alessandra Bianchi.

MEN The men’s final had no history: in 45 minutes, Fede Chingotto and Ale Galan beat Arturo Coello and Agustin Tapia. An exceptional performance, that of the number 2 on the draw: two as the unforced errors committed throughout the match, a match that bordered on perfection, which began with a break in the first game, continued with a second stretch on 4-1 and with yet another (break to zero in the seventh game) to close out the partial. And the game did not change in the second set, which started with another break and continued with an extraordinary Fede Chingotto in defence: the Argentine recovered an incredible ball by surprising Coello and Tapia in the middle for the 5-1, and with another recovery from outside the court came the victory point. “Everything was perfect, we are overjoyed – Galan’s words -. We leave all the tactics to Jorge Martinez, we are soldiers at his command. After yesterday’s fight (almost three-hour semifinal against Navarro and Lebron, ed) it was very hard, but today we tried to put all the energy we had left into it”. Chingotto, like Galan, thanked the Genova fans speaking in Italian: “Thank you very much to all the fans for the strength. I have no words for today’s final, it was a perfect game. I thank everyone who helped us in this tournament and in this final. We are happy to have won because we always have the number 1s in front of us, but we want more and we have to continue like this, already from Malaga”. And from P1 to start tomorrow.

WOMEN In the women’s final, the number 4 seed (who were returning to play together right from P2 in Genova) got off to a great start, leading the first set with a break in the opening set and holding the advantage until 6-3. The script was the same in the second set, but unlike in the first, Sanchez and Josemaria were immediately back in the game. In the tenth game, on ‘Martita’ Ortega’s serve, the Spaniards even had two set points to go to the third: Araujo cancelled the first with a smash, then Sanchez failed the second, and finally Ortega with a shot in the middle between Paula and Ari extended the match. The tiebreak, on the other hand, had no history, with Ortega and Araujo winning it with a score of 7-1, taking advantage of several errors by the number 1 ranked players (33 in total at the end of the match against the 16 of the winners), who thus failed in the Italian Rome-Genova double. Araujo, on the other hand, with this success overtakes Lucia Sainz and Claudia Jensen and climbs to tenth position in the FIP ranking. “We have no words for such a success – the two winners said –. A joy that we cannot explain. We still don’t understand what we managed to do, it was a perfect match”. The one you need against the number 1 in the world.