Austria’s current No. 1 doubles player, Lucas Miedler, had twice the reason to celebrate on Friday. The 28-year-old from Tulln advanced to the doubles semifinals of the Erste Bank Open alongside his Portuguese partner Francisco Cabral, defeating the No. 4 seeds Joe Salisbury and Neal Skupski 6–3, 6–4.
In doing so, Miedler repeated his feat from last year, when he – back then with Alexander Erler – had beaten the same British pair in a thrilling three-set final at the Wiener Stadthalle. “We played extremely well. Our service and return games were strong. We only got broken once, just before the new balls. I’m super happy with our performance,” said Miedler.
Picture: e|motion/Stefan Strasser
About the atmosphere in the Marx Halle, he added: “It’s really, really good here. Incredible what’s been set up. There were a lot of people — including my family and friends from my tennis club. The atmosphere was fantastic.”
But the day wasn’t over yet: following the victory, Miedler was also presented with the Lower Austria Athlete of the Year award — a hectic but all the more successful day for the Austrian.
