It was a case of sixth time lucky for No2 seed Lucas
Serme
when the Frenchman upset top-seeded Dane
Kristian Frost Olesen
in today's final of the
Austrian Open,
the PSA
Challenger 5
squash event at
Tenniscourt Sud
in
Salzburg.
The top two seeds reached the climax of the event celebrating its fifth
successive year in Salzburg in contrasting styles. Olesen despatched
Swiss opponent Reiko
Peter
in straight games while Serme came back from two games down against
fourth seed Mahesh
Mangaonkar
to force a decider – then the Indian was forced to retire midway through
the game suffering with severe cramp.
"After a 20-minute long opening game, which Lucas won 11-6, Kristian was
able to lift the pressure more and came back strong to win the second
game 11-5 to level the match," said event promoter Aqeel
Rehman.
"The third game was the deciding game. The pace and intensity was
enormous and the sold out crowd was fascinated by the retrieval skills
of both players. Kristian had that little bit of advantage through most
of the game until 9-7. But it was then when Lucas geared up and reached
game ball at 10-9. However it took him another game ball to finish the
game 12-10."
Serme went on to wrap up the fourth to close out the match 11-7, 5-11,
12-10, 11-3 in 81 minutes to record his first victory over the Dane in
six meetings.
"Before the tournament I didn't have a lot of confidence, as it was my
first tournament after injury since November," said Serme
(pictured below with Rehman) after winning
the fifth PSA World Tour title of his career.
"I am happy to win and am thankful to have won after I lost here in the
semi-final last year. By the time I was feeling even better and my back
and hip was fine.
"Thanks to Aqeel for putting on the tournament as it is hard to play an
run the event."
