The ÖTTV duo lost in the final on Thursday evening against world champions Mattias Falck/Kristian Karlsson from Sweden 1:3 (10,-1,-5,-11) after leading the set. For Habesohn/Gardos it was the third defeat in the fifth European doubles final, in 2012 and 2018 they had won the title. Sofia Polcanova and her Romanian partner Bernadette Szocs also fought for gold in the evening.
Habesohn and Gardos had defeated the French Alexis and Félix Lebrun 3:1 (-3,7,8,6) in the semifinals of the European Championships. After that, Habesohn said in the Rudi Sedlmayr Hall: “Now we want to achieve a positive result in the final after two gold medals and two silver medals.” In the end, this wish did not come true, in the final the two only put the Swedes under pressure at the beginning.
In the first set, the two Austrians initially lost a 5:1 lead, then fended off two set balls and in turn converted their first to 12:10. In the second and third round, the Swedes made short work of it, the two ÖTTV athletes only scored six points in the phase. In the fourth set, Habesohn and Gardos fought back and fended off four match points, Falck/Karlsson then used the fifth to win and win their first European Championship title.
Austria still has another gold chance: Polcanova/Szöcs, seeded number 3, gave Maria Xiao/Adina Diaconu (ESP/ROU-29) no chance in the semifinals. With 3:0 (2,7,6) they swept over their opponents in just 16 minutes and are in the final without losing a set. In this, the Austrian-Romanian pairing meets the Romanian duo Elizabeta Samara/Andreea Dragoman.
In the singles Karoline Mischek had to bow to the Serbian Sabina Surjan clearly with 0:4 (-8,-7,-9,-6) and was eliminated in the sixteenth final. “I’m very happy with the European Championship, even if the last match was very disappointing,” summed up the 24-year-old. Polcanova was also in singles before her doubles final and she won this sixteenth final against Ho Tin-tin from England 4:1 (9.9.9.-9.8).
Source: Nachrichten
