Austrians Alexander Erler and Lucas Miedler completed a dream week on home soil on Saturday in Kitzbühel. The wild cards defeated third seeds Roman Jebavy and Matwe Middelkoop 7-5, 7-6(5) to win their first ATP Tour title at the Generali Open.

Erler and Miedler were both making their tour-level debuts and teaming for the first time this week in Kitzbühel. The Austrians won 68 per cent (32/47) of their first-service points as they claimed victory in 90 minutes.

“It feels amazing, words cannot describe what happened today,” Meidler said. “We are happy, and in front of this home crowd, to win a first ATP Tour title together is unbelievable.

“We played well and the other guys played some good tennis. Our strength this week has been winning tie-breaks. We just focused on every point, we started well in the tie-break. We kept believing.”

The wild cards upset top seeds Tomislav Brkic and Nikola Cacic as well as fourth seeds Ariel Behar and Guillermo Duran en route to the final. Erler has reached one ATP Challenger Tour semi-final this year, while Miedler has enjoyed runs to the last four three times. The last Austrian player to take home the doubles title in Kitzbühel was Philipp Oswald in 2019 (w/Polasek).

Jebavy and Middelkoop were competing in their third ATP Tour final as a team, having captured the 2017 St. Petersburg title.