EDWARDSVILLE – The doubles finalists for the $25,000 USTA Pro Circuit Edwardsville Futures tournament presented by the EGHM Foundation have been determined while all but two of the top-seeded players in the singles competition were eliminated Thursday.
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The team of Nicolas Alveraz of Peru and Liam Caruana of Italy will take on the American duo of Nicholas Meister and Evan Zhu at 5 p.m. today on Court 3 of the Edwardsville High School tennis center for the doubles championship of the tournament; the match will be live-streamed on riverbender.com.
Alveraz/Caruana defeated Americans Alex Brown/Sean Sculley 7-6 (7-4), 7-6 (7-5) to advance to this evening’s final, while Meister/Zuh eliminated fellow Americans Trent Bryde/Vasil Kirkov 6-0, 6-0 to reach the final in Thursday’s semifinal matches.
Alvarez, who is a rising senior at Duke, also reached this morning’s singles quarterfinals after defeating American Nick Chappell 6-2, 6-4 Thursday; Alvarez is in the running for the $1,000 bonus presented to the player who accumulates the most points in the Illinois Swing of the Pro Circuit tour, which consists of tournaments in Champaign, Decatur and Edwardsville. Maxime Cressy of France currently leads the points standings for the bonus, which will be presented following Sunday morning’s singles final; Cressy reached the singles quarters after eliminating second-seeded Caruana 6-1, 6-2.
Meister, who was playing with a different partner, defeated Alvarez/Caruana in the semifinals of last week’s Ursula Beck Futures semifinals; Zhu, who is playing with Meister this week, won this year’s NCAA doubles title.
Sebastian Korda, who fell to Alvarez in last week’s Ursula Beck singles final, advanced to the quarters Thursday after defeating No. 5 seed Ronnie Schneider 6-3, 5-7, 7-5; Korda, the son of 1998 Australian Open champion Petr Korda, is the world’s No. 2 junior player and won this year’s Australian Open junior crown; he has a chance to win the Illinois Swing bonus, but must reach and win Sunday morning’s singles final to do so.
In other second-round singles matches Thursday, top-seeded Ryan Shane (a one-time NCAA singles champion) advanced with a 6-2, 6-2 win over Santiago Fe Rodriguez Taverna of Argentina; American Paul Oosterbaan advanced with a 6-3, 6-2 win over third-seeded American Michael Redlicki; Argentine Axel Geller ousted No. 7 seed Strong Kirchheimer of the USA 4-6, 6-3, 6-2; fourth-seeded Sebastein Boltz of France advanced to the quarters with a 6-3, 6-3 win over American Andres Andrade; and Alfredo Perez of the USA advanced with a 6-0, retired win over Japan’s Kento Takeuchi.
Friday’s singles quarterfinals feature Shane against Alvarez and Geller meeting Boltz, both at 9 a.m.; Oosterbaan takes on Korda and Perez meets Cressy, with both matches starting not before 10 a.m., leading to Friday evening’s doubles final.
Friday is Fan Appreciation Day at the tournament presented by Edwardsville Township; all fans will be admitted free to today’s card. The singles semifinals are set for Saturday, followed by the singles final at 11 a.m. Sunday. For updated information and live scoring, visit www.edwardsvillefutures.com or www.itftennis.com.
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