Mathur And Callis Capture MFS Pro-Am Boston Doubles Title by Rob Dinerman Dateline January 12, 2020 –
Trailing two games to love and later 9-7 in the fifth game against
Michael Ferreira and Will Hartigan, top seeds Manek Mathur and Chris
Callis engineered an 8-1 match-closing run, which they then followed up
with a competitive but convincing 15-7, 10-15, 15-10, 15-9 final-round
victory this afternoon over No. 2 seeds James Stout and Greg McArthur
to win the 26th edition on the MFS Pro-Am Boston tournament, held as
always at the University Club of Boston. It was the third SDA pro
doubles tournament that Mathur and Callis have won in the past seven
weeks (preceded by the Sleepy Hollow Open and Briggs Cup), each time at
the final-round expense of Stout and McArthur.
It was an exciting weekend, during which four straight
rounds had at least one five-game match. This phenomenon began with the
final round of qualifying, in which the Patrick Nku/Tor
Christofferson and Gavan Hitchenor/Cole Osborne pairings earned
their way into the main draw by a combined three points. Hitchenor and
Osborne eked out a 15-13 fifth-game win over Pat Malloy and Dan
Roberts, while Nku and Christofferson had to survive a simultaneous
match-ball against Mark Porter and Rafik Bhaloo. The drama continued in
the round of 16, during which Will Mariani and Thomas Brinkman edged
Clinton Leeuw and Omar El Kashef, 15-12 in the fifth, and Graham
Bassett and Hamed Anvari out-lasted qualifiers Lyell Fuller and Tim
Lasusa in five games as well.
Bassett has been in a number of five-game matches at this venue
in recent years, including winning two one-pointers (with Ian Power
over Shaun Johnstone/Baset Chaudhry in 2014 and with John Roberts over
Tyler Hamilton and Rob Nigro two years ago on a mis-hit winner at
14-all). On this weekend he played his second five-gamer in as
many days when he and Anvari led Stout and McArthur two games to one
and drew to 10-11 in the fourth game in the closest of the quarterfinal
matches. But Stout and McArthur ran off the last four points of that
game and asserted themselves in the 15-8 fifth, following which they
won their semifinal in three close games over reigning North American
Open Doubles champs Robin Clarke and Zac Alexander, four-game quarters
winners over Mariani and Brinkman.
In the top-half semi, Ferreira and Hartigan, who had
advanced to that stage with a pair of 3-0 wins over first
Christofferson/Patrick and then Adam Bews and James Bamber, were
sharper and more aggressive throughout the first two games than Mathur
and Callis. Ferreira was boldly going for winners, Hartigan was
powerful and error-free, and the No. 1 seeds seemed a bit out of sorts
and on their heels. They managed to escape with the 15-13 third game
and won the fourth as well, but at 7-all in the fifth, Ferreira nailed
a pair of consecutive shallow cross-court nicks that died in front of
Callis for 9-7. It is to the credit of the Mathur/Callis duo that, even
on a day when they were slightly off their game and under pressure from
a strong and upset-seeking opponent, they were still able to grind
through the next batch of points and close out the match the way that
they did.
Mathur and Callis were pretty much in control of the
final, albeit with a slight interruption in the second game. In both
the third and close-out fourth, Stout and McArthur held their ground
till about midway through, at which point Mathur and Callis ran off a
swift and decisive mid-game spurt (from 5-all to 9-5 in the third game
and from 6-all to 12-6 in the fourth) that effectively sealed the
outcome. Mathur is a sniper who can pound the ball into the nick from
almost any spot on the court and create beautiful angles up front.
Callis is relentlessly steady and can shoot the lights out as well.
They have acquired quite a head of steam with their trio of consecutive
tournaments wins as the tour heads into the important events in
Greenwich and Brooklyn that await during the next month and a half.
