New Zealand’s doubles specialist Artem Sitak earned a Wild-Card into Asb Classic main draw by winning the NZL Championships.
Artem Sitak, a 30 year-old, is ranked 62nd in doubles, with a best ranking of 39. He has been focusing on doubles since 2014, playing singles only sometimes. At the moment he does not have a singles ranking, having played just three matches (W-L 0-3) in 2016.
However, in December he decided to play the New Zealand Championships, in both singles and doubles. It was not a surprise that he won the doubles tournament, with Marcus Daniell, beating Finn Tearney and Ben McLachlan 6-1 6-4, but he was also able to take the trophy in singles. In his impressive run, he defeat
ed Ajeet Rai 2-6 6-2 6-1, Victor Romero 5-7 6-4 6-1, Ben McLachlan 6-2 6-1, and the first seed Finn Tearney 6-2 6-0 in the final.
“Nobody could have predicted that and everything worked out my way,” he said. “I was playing really well, staying in the moment and focussing on every point. Every game was close and it could have gone either way, but I just played a bit better in the important moments. For two singles matches in a row I played really well. ”
In this way, he earned a wild-card into the main draw of the Atp 250 tournament of Auckland, where he had never played (excepting the qualifying). Sitak, who has an effective serve and volley game, will be a tough first-round-opponent, especially on a fast surface.
“It is really amazing,” he said. “I have wanted to play main draw at the ASB Classic for so long, I tried many times and made the final round of qualifying a few times, but never got through to the main draw. It is going to be really special to play the main draw here.”
Despite this success, Sitak says he won’t change his long term view on tennis and doubles will remain a priority for him.
“I am still going to Chennai or Doha the week before the ASB Classic for doubles and obviously I am focusing on doubles, so I will practice that. But at the same time, it does improve my singles game, I have played really well in singles so I do not think it is going to affect me much.” he added.
