Milano Premier Padel P1 champions Ale Galan and Juan Lebron retained their crown in Milan last week. The pair, who also won last year’s Greenweez Paris Major Premier Padel title, were made to work hard for it, however, needing three hours to beat Argentina’s Franco Stupaczuk and Martin Di Nenno 7-6(6) 6-7(4) 7-6(5) in an epic battle.
The two champions repeat last year’s success after an extraordinarily intense final against Di Nenno and Stupaczuk, who did very well to hold their own against the two winners during three hours of emotional battle.
The first set was tremendously even, with both pairs signing very similar numbers. So much so that, among so many finishes that questioned the usefulness of the lobs and the level of the writer of these lines, he decided in the tie-break for a tiny detail. A shot by the Argentinian pair did not touch glass, but a fence. He could have flown back to his field, but he went up into the Milan sky. It rained down and gave Galán the opportunity to play one more ball with Stupaczuk and Di Nenno unstructured, which ended up meaning the first set for the Spaniards.
Far from the Superpibes falling apart, the duel continued along the same paths, raising even more the level of padel that was being seen at the Allianz Cloud headquarters to decide the champions of the Milan Premier Padel P1 2023. Martín Di Nenno and Franco Stupaczuk were present and sent the final in Milan to the third set in another exciting and intense tiebreak.
The third set was the culmination of everything seen so far. Not even the two hours of play that the four players had been on court slowed down the pace of a tremendous final.
7-6, 6-7, 7-6 was the final score, in a sort of doubly chiastic mantra that gave the contest an even more epic dimension.
“Well played our opponents, Franco and Martin, because the four of us really put on a show,” said Lebron afterwards. “And thanks to Ale for backing me up, especially in the second set when I didn’t play well. We’ve had a tough season and spent a long time out because of injury, but here we are with the trophy in our hands.”
“I’m very proud of the work we’ve done and what we showed on the court,” added Galan. “We really wanted to be back to our best.”
