Day 4: the top seeds don’t fail. Chozas and Augsburger continue to dream

Two confirmations and two new entries from the Comunidad de Madrid Premier Padel P1. The second of the three European tournaments in a row is ready to enter the decisive weekend: at the Ahoy Rotterdam, the familiar faces are the usual ones, those of Arturo Coello and Agustin Tapia at the top of the draw and those of Fede Chingotto and Ale Galan at the bottom. The number 1 seeds, already winners last Sunday in Spain, were only on court for an hour and 4 minutes before beating Alex Ruiz and Javi Garrido (6) 6-3 6-1. In the semifinals, in the second match of the morning session starting at 10 a.m. CET, Coello/Tapia will find the big surprise of the week, the Argentinians Alex Chozas and Leo Augsburger who, after having defeated Martin Di Nenno and Juan Lebron in the round of 16, continued their march by beating Coki Nieto and Jon Sanz 3-6 7-6 6-4, coming back from behind as they had already done on Thursday in the round of 16. In the evening, however, came the successes of the number 4 and number 2 pairs on the draw: Franco Stupaczuk and Mike Yanguas, with 6-2 4-6 6-3 in two hours and 35 minutes to Juan Tello and Fernando Belasteguin, redeemed their elimination in the quarters in Madrid by qualifying for the semifinals for the first time since they have been playing together as a pair. Tomorrow, however, it will be the ‘Chingalan’, who in the most awaited match of the day stopped the run of Paquito Navarro and Pablo Cardona (5) 6-2 6-2 in 55 minutes.

WOMEN Opening the semifinals schedule in Rotterdam at 10am CET, however, will be the challenge at the top of the women’s draw. On one side, Paula Josemaria and Ari Sanchez, who in just 55 minutes gave up three games to Aranzazu Osoro and Veronica Virseda (6-2 6-1); on the other side, Lucia Sainz and Patty Llaguno who, thanks to a 6-4 6-3 win over Jessica Castelló and Alejandra Salazar, after being eliminated in the first round in Madrid, return to play a semi-final that had been missing since the P1 in Malaga, when they lost to the world number 1s. In the bottom half, not before 4 p.m., Gemma Triay and Claudia Fernandez – who in the evening eliminated Ksenia Sharifova and Lucia Martinez Gomez with a double 6-3 – will take on Marta Ortega and Sofia Araujo (4), who in the evening session match on court number 2 won 6-3 6-1 over Marina Guinart and Victoria Iglesias.