Day 4 Portugal against Spain; Italy with a comeback, tomorrow there is France

Cagliari and Sardinia dragged Italy to a comeback and qualification for the semifinals. As in the women’s draw, in the men’s draw of the FIP European Padel Championships the semifinals will be Spain-Portugal and Italy-France. But those quarterfinals were tight matches, starting with the tie between Italy and Sweden, which began with Rutgersson/Windahl’s success over Dominguez/Sinicropi. But it was there that Italy’s comeback began, able to draw level thanks to Cremona/Cassetta’s three-set win over Axelsson/Olsson. “It was a very tough match for the result we entered with and for the pair we had in front of us – the Azzurri said –. As the games went by, however, we played clearly better and the crowd was sensational’. Italy’s fans were also decisive in the third match, with Graziotti/Patiniotis completing a fantastic evening, to the notes of ‘Sarà perché ti amo’, a song that has become famous not only among Italians. In the bottom half of the draw, that of Italy, France needed only two matches to win the tie against Germany: 6-2 6-4 for Bergeron/Maigret over Lindmeyer/Merten, then double 6-4 for Blanque/Leygue over Reca/Wunner.

Same at the top end for Spain, who got the better of the Netherlands: Leal/Rico beat Meijer/Richters 6-4 7-6, then Arroyo and Ruiz gave up only three games (6-1 6-2) to Maarsen and Roper. Spain will face Portugal tomorrow (from 4 p.m.), who closed in a two-game tie against Great Britain thanks to the Deus brothers and Pascoal/Perry. Women and men, same semifinals: from 9 a.m., in Cagliari, the atmosphere will be very hot.