It was a mixed evening for Austrian teams on the Red Bull Beach Arena as two of three men’s teams bit the dust at the A1 Major Vienna presented by Swatch.
First the good news: The stunning performance of Martin Ermacora and Moritz Pristauz. The duo lost their first match of the day and needed to beat Bartosz Losiak and Piotr Kantor in order to make it through to Friday. And they did it. And did it brilliantly, progressing in straight sets in front of a packed Red Bull Beach Arena crowd.
Their reward for such a scintillating victory is a Round of 24 meeting against Qataris Cherif Younousse and Ahmed Tijan. There will not be an empty seat in the house when the two teams fight for a place in the next phase at 12.45pm CEST.
Ok. So for the bad news. Clemens Doppler and Alex Horst and Philipp Waller and Robin Seidl lost their pool survivor matches and therefore crashed out of their home Major to the disappointment of their masses ranks of fans.
For Seidl and Waller it was a case of so near yet so far. They dominated the first set but were pegged back by Americans Trevor Crabb and Tri Bourne. There was no stopping the Austrians in the second set as they took the match to a tiebreak. In the decider the home side had the advantage, but just when it looked as though they would pull out a victory back came Trevor and Tri to stun the home crowd.
After that frustration the home fans then endured a straight sets defeat for Doppler and Horst against World Championship silver medalists Clemens Wickler and Julius Thole of Germany.
The home heroes could do nothing to prevent their opponents from securing a place in the elimination stage. For the Germans, they now face Poland’s Grzegorz Fijalek and Michal Bryl on Friday as they aim to find the form that swept them all the way to the final of their home World Championships.
