Sunday brought the seven-day jubilee edition of the Wojciech Fibak Grand Prix to a close. Four finals produced four titles and six national flags on the trophies — Serbian, Czech, Danish, Ukrainian, Belgian and Italian. The Polish flag was not among them.
Djordje Sapic won the boys’ singles title, while Sara Oliveriusova triumphed in the girls’ competition. The doubles titles went to Caroline Hermanns and Anna-Adelina Nykyforuk, and to Nicolas Fays and Marco Meacci.
SAPIC DROPPED JUST ONE SET IN THE ENTIRE TOURNAMENT
The third-seeded Serbian came through five rounds while dropping only one set — against Marco Meacci in the semifinal. In Sunday’s final, he overwhelmed Nikolai Shibani in the opening set before closing out the second 7–5.
The final between the third and fourth seeds reflected everything that had happened earlier in the tournament. Top seed Tavish Pahwa was eliminated in the quarterfinals, while No. 2 seed Lasse Bohr departed as early as the second round. Bohr was knocked out by Jorge Martinez Vasquez — the only unseeded semifinalist. The Spaniard went on to eliminate sixth seed Wiktor Jeż in the quarterfinals before his run was finally ended by Shibani.
CZECH CLEAN SWEEP IN THE GIRLS’ DRAW
The girls’ draw belonged to the Czech players. Five entered the tournament, four reached the quarterfinals and two contested the final. Second seed Sara Oliveriusova took the title, conceding only one game to Elly Meszarosova.
Like Sapic, Oliveriusova lost only one set throughout the tournament — also in the semifinal. The only earlier moment when her title challenge came under serious threat was in the quarterfinal against Tamina Saken, when she won two tie-breaks, 7–4 and 7–3.
Meszarosova finished the tournament as the only unseeded singles finalist. On her way to the title match, she eliminated sixth seed Yerkezhan Zhanatayeva after recovering from losing the opening set 1–6.
OUT IN THE FIRST ROUND, HOME WITH A TROPHY
The most remarkable journey of the week belonged to Caroline Hermanns. The Dane, seeded No. 1 in singles, lost her opening match to Polish qualifier Anna Idaszewska. Four days later, she walked onto Court 3 as the top seed in doubles and won the final alongside Anna-Adelina Nykyforuk, defeating the No. 2 seeds.
Nykyforuk 
The final had originally been scheduled for Saturday evening. Rain arrived after the semifinals and postponed it until the following day.
FAYS AND MEACCI WIN THE DOUBLES WITHOUT DROPPING A SET
Second seeds Nicolas Fays of Belgium and Marco Meacci of Italy won four matches without dropping a set. They had to play twice on Sunday: first in the postponed semifinal and then in the final against the Ukrainian pair Tymur Chukanov and Volodymyr Revenko.
Meacci For both champions, it was the perfect conclusion to a week in which their singles campaigns had ended earlier. Fays reached the quarterfinals, while Meacci advanced to the semifinals before losing to Sapic, who had collected the boys’ singles trophy just a few hours before the doubles final. Chukanov and Revenko lost only the final match of their campaign, having previously eliminated the first and third seeds
TWO SEMIFINALS FOR POLISH PLAYERS
Twenty-four Polish players competed in the main draw — 12 in each singles competition. Six of the eight available qualifying places also went to Polish players.
The best results came in doubles. Antoni Kasperski and Hubert Plenkiewicz eliminated the fourth seeds before reaching the semifinal, where they lost 0–6, 3–6 to the eventual champions on Sunday morning. Zofia Janusz and Martyna Sikora of AZS Poznań also reached the semifinals, where they were stopped by finalists Ching Ying Chen and Yen-Ni Chiang.
In singles, Jakub Jędryka and Wiktor Jeż advanced to the quarterfinals. Jędryka was the only player in the last eight to have previously completed all three rounds of qualifying.
Anna Idaszewska also deserves a special mention. The Poznań player from Park Tenisowy Olimpia reached the main draw through qualifying, defeated the top seed in the opening round and then lost a three-set second-round match featuring two tie-breaks. She finished just two points short of a place in the quarterfinals.
SEVEN DAYS, 25 COUNTRIES
The jubilee edition set a new record for international participation. Players from 25 countries appeared at the AZS Poznań courts — from India and Kazakhstan through Taiwan to the United States and Great Britain. No previous edition of the Grand Prix had welcomed representatives of so many nations.
The weather did not make the organisers’ task easy. The tournament began with heavy rain that delayed the first qualifying matches until the afternoon. A heatwave arrived in the middle of the week, while Saturday’s rain postponed the girls’ doubles final. Despite everything, every scheduled match was completed — the last one with a one-day delay.
The story of Ana Chindris will also be remembered. The Romanian mistakenly withdrew from the main draw, requested a wild card into qualifying, won three rounds and reached the quarterfinals of the draw from which she had previously removed herself.
There was another memorable story involving Jan Skrzyński, the son of Magdalena Grzybowska. He won his first-round match in the city where his mother was born — the leading Polish female tennis player before the era of Agnieszka Radwańska.
FIBAK: IT WAS MY MUM AND DAD’S IDEA
The tournament patron was present at the AZS courts every day throughout the week. He watched not only the finals but also the qualifying matches, where he was particularly impressed by the one-handed backhand of Italy’s Luca Maria Pomilio.
During the closing ceremony, Wojciech Fibak praised the high sporting standard of the tournament and the professionalism of its organisation. He thanked the partners and sponsors, as well as tournament director Jacek Muzolf, for preparing the 50th edition.
After the ceremony, his thoughts returned to the tournament’s beginnings. It was created by his parents in the late 1970s.
“I think of them, of my mum and dad, and the idea they had — a very innovative and original one — to create a tennis tournament in Poznań,” Fibak said.
The first editions exceeded the organisers’ expectations. “So many players came from all over Poland that we had to organise the tournament at four clubs — not only at AZS, but also on the courts of Grunwald, Warta and Olimpia,” the patron recalled.
It was a different era, and travelling to such a tournament carried a different meaning. Players came to Poznań from across Poland, including Silesia, where Dariusz Łukaszewski brought his young players. Today, he is the president of the Polish Tennis Association and had visited the AZS courts the previous day. As he recalled, the tournament was a true celebration of tennis. Everyone wanted to play in the Wojciech Fibak Grand Prix because it was a major event — and because there was more to win than just a trophy.
“I used to provide tennis rackets as prizes. In the 1980s, even a tennis racket was a treasure,” Fibak said.
A racket is no longer such a rarity, and the tournament has changed. “I am pleased that the competition is now more international, because in those days it was mainly Polish,” he explained. “I am delighted that we have so many participants from all over the world — even from Taiwan this year. That is something extraordinary. And the standard is getting higher every year.”
Taiwan made its mark twice in this edition, with Ching Ying Chen and Yen-Ni Chiang reaching the girls’ doubles final as the second seeds.
Finally, Fibak returned to what he had seen on Sunday. “There were some wonderful matches in the boys’ competition this year, and in the girls’ competition too. Of course, the Czechs won. Just as they always seem to win at Wimbledon, they also won here in Poznań.”
The 50th edition of the Wojciech Fibak Grand Prix has passed into history.
