Spaniards Roberto Carballes Baena and Alejandro Davidovich Fokina played together for the first time this week at the Chile Dove Men+Care Open in Santiago. But it certainly didn’t seem that way.
Carballes Baena and Davidovich Fokina defeated second seeds Marcelo Arevalo and Jonny O’Mara 7-6(3), 6-1 on Saturday to lift the trophy. The Spaniards only dropped one set en route to the title.
Neither man had won a tour-level doubles match in 2020 entering the week, and Davidovich Fokina had never played one at all. But the Top 100 singles players in the FedEx ATP Rankings found rhythm in Santiago, eliminating two of the four seeded teams (also third seeds Sharan/Sitak) en route to their triumph.
[ATP APP]
The key to the match was the first-set tie-break. Carballes Baena and Davidovich Fokina won two of their first three return points of the tie-break and they never looked back, winning the set and then breaking in their first two return games of the second set. The champions triumphed after one hour and 11 minutes.
The victors won more second-serve points (72%) than their opponents did first-serve points (64%). They also saved two of the three break points they faced.
Carballes Baena and Davidovich Fokina each earn 250 FedEx ATP Doubles Ranking points and a share of $34,160.
Arevalo and O’Mara, who reached this year’s Australian Open quarter-finals as well as semi-finals in New York and Delray Beach, fall to 10-4 on the season after making their first ATP Tour final as a team. They each add 150 points to their tally and a split of $17,500.
