After a week of tough battles in Toronto, Marcelo Arevalo and Jean-Julien Rojer saved their best until last to lift the trophy Sunday at the National Bank Open Presented by Rogers.
The unseeded Salvadoran-Dutch pair delivered a high-class championship-match display to prevail 6-3, 6-1 against Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury and claim their maiden ATP Masters 1000 crown. Arevalo and Rojer combined rock-solid baseline play with plenty of delicate touches at the net to race to victory in just 60 minutes at Sobeys Stadium.
“This was great. We have played well for the past year and a half. We reached a lot of goals together. We won a Grand Slam title, but of course we want to do great also at the Masters,” said Arevalo. “So we were looking for that big title, and I’m super, super proud we were able to do it here in Toronto.”
Arevalo and Rojer had won three of their four matches en route to the final in a Match Tie-break, but after clinching the only break of the first set in the fourth game in Sunday’s final they barely looked back. The broke their opponents’ serve three times in the second set to claim their third ATP Tour title of the year.
“I’m not sure what made the difference [today],” said Rojer. “I know that Marcelo and I, coming into the match, were playing quite well. Once you get to the finals, and you play a great team like Joe and Raj, the margins are little. It says [6-3, 6-1], and you can say whatever you want, but we know that a point here or there [can make a difference].
“We were still fighting to win that last game, because you never know what can happen out here.”
It was a first Masters 1000 crown for El Salvador’s Arevalo and a fourth for Rojer, who also triumphed in Miami in 2013 (with Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi) and in 2016 and 2019 in Madrid (both with Horia Tecau). The pair has now won seven tour-level titles together, including a major triumph at Roland Garros in 2022.
Arevalo and Rojer have risen seven spots to No. 7 in the Pepperstone ATP Live Doubles Rankings as a result of their exploits in Toronto this week. They qualified for last year’s Nitto ATP Finals in their first season together.
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