Toby Samuel seals back-to-back Hersonissos Challenger titles, David Stevenson wins in Cherbourg & Indian Wells mixed doubles finalists
• 3 minute read
All the latest from the British tennis stars around the world, including more ATP Challenger Tour titles, Indian Wells success, wheelchair doubles finalists an more.
Samuel extends winning run in Greece
Toby Samuel made it back-to-back ATP Challenger Tour titles in Hersonissos, Greece last weekend – his fourth Challenger trophy since November.
Aiming to defend his title from the week before, the 23-year-old Brit battled through the tournament without dropping a set.
In the final, he defeated Czechia’s Maxim Mrva 6-2, 6-3 to extend his unbeaten run to 15 matches, dating back to the M25 Vale do Lobo in February.
His impressive results over the last few weeks have earnt him a top 200 ranking spot for the first time in his career – rising 73 places to a career-high world No.171.
Paul Jubb also enjoyed a strong week in Hersonissos – reaching the semi-finals before losing to Mrva 6-3, 6-1.
Stevenson adds third Challenger of the season
David Stevenson won his third ATP Challenger tournament of the season, his second with Canadian Cleeve Harper, in Cherbourg, France.
Stevenson and Harper – who also lifted silverware in Oeiras in January – won three of their four matches in deciding set tie-breaks en route to another Challenger title.
They came back from a set down to defeat Polish duo Karol Drzewiecki and Szymon Walkow in the final 4-6, 6-3, 10-8.
27-year-old Stevenson has already bettered his career-best season in 2024 where he won two Challenger titles with fellow Brits Charles Broom and Marcus Willis.
Glasspool & Dabrowski finish as mixed doubles runners-up at Indian Wells
Sticking with doubles, Britain’s Lloyd Glasspool also made the mixed doubles final at the BNP Paribas Open Indian Wells last week with Canadian Gabriella Dabrowski.
The top seeds knocked out Greek duo Maria Sakkari and Stefanos Tsitsipas 6-2, 4-6, 13-11 in the semi-final of the exhibition event to move on to the final.
In the title-decider they faced Belinda Bencic and Flavio Cobolli, losing out 6-3, 2-6, 10-7 to the Swiss, Italian team.
Elsewhere, Jack Draper and Cam Norrie made singles quarter-finals, while Sonay Kartal reached the fourth round of the women’s singles.
Shuker reaches Georgia Open final
Lucy Shuker reached her fourth Georgia Open women’s doubles final since 2022 as Britain’s leading wheelchair players began three weeks of tournaments in the USA.
Runners-up last year, British No.1 Shuker and Aniek van Koot of the Netherlands defeated the all-Dutch third-seeded pairing of Jinte Bos and Lizzy de Greef 6-3, 4-6, 10-8 in the semi-finals.
However, a second successive deciding match tie-break slowly ebbed away from the second seeds as Kgothatso Montjane of South African and Luoyao Guo of China took the WT500 title 7-6(3), 6-7(4), 10-3.
Elsewhere, Ben Bartram produced the outstanding result among the Brits in the men’s singles, the British No.3 defeating world No.8 Ruben Spaargaren 6-4, 6-2 in the quarter-finals. In beating third seed Spaargaren, Bartram equalled his career-best win by ranking as he beat a top 10-ranked opponent for the fifth time before bowing out in the semi-finals to world No.3 Martin de la Puente 6-4, 7-6(3)
Andrew Penney faired best of the Brits in the men’s doubles after partnering Frenchman Nicolas Charrier to an early 2-6, 6-4, 10-5 win over Bartram and the USA’s Casey Ratzlaff.
Andy Lapthorne and Greg Slade both bowed out of the quad singles in the quarter-finals, with Lapthorne’s sequence of five successive quad doubles finals since November with Australia’s Heath Davidson coming to an end in the semi-finals. Lapthorne and Davidson lost out to eventual champions Donald Rahmphadi and Jin Woodman 6-1, 3-6, 10-8.
The seven Brits who contested the Georgia Open will now be joined by Alfie Hewett and Gordon Reid for the Cajun Classic WT1000 in Baton Rouge, which begins on Tuesday.
Broom & Adeshina star on ITF Tour
Broom had a positive week of his own competing in France at the M25 Creteil, reaching both the singles and doubles finals.
In the singles, Broom beat countryman Anton Matusevich 7-6(6), 6-2 to progress to his second final of the season, but eventually finished runner-up to German Marvin Moeller 6-3, 6-2.
Broom teamed up with another German, Daniel Masur in the doubles, with the duo going on to lift the title.
They beat Tim Ruehl and Kai Wehnelt in the final 6-2, 6-4 to claim Broom’s second ITF doubles trophy of 2026.
Britain’s Esther Adeshina came away with the singles and doubles titles at the W15 Victoriaville.
Adeshina beat Alexandra Vagramov of Canada 6-4, 4-6, 6-2 in the final of the women’s singles.
She then combined with Vagramov to defeat Jaedan Brown and Sofia Johnson 6-3, 6-3 in the women’s doubles final.
