Halys wins maiden ATP title, ends Bublik’s Kitzbühel repeat bid
Quentin Halys claimed his first ATP Tour title at 29, beating defending champion Alexander Bublik for the second time in a fortnight to become the first Frenchman to win Kitzbühel.
Quentin Halys, Kitzbuhel 2026 | © ©Generali Open/Alexander Scheuber
Frenchman Quentin Halys won his maiden ATP Tour title at 29, beating defending champion and world No. 11 Alexander Bublik 6-4, 7-6 in the Kitzbühel final on Saturday for his second win over the Kazakh in as many weeks.
Both men held serve for most of the contest, Bublik’s only lapse coming when he was broken at 5-4 in the first set. The second set went to a tie-break, where Bublik led 6-5 and held a set point that would have forced a decider, only for Halys to save it and close out the title on his first match point.
The win denies Bublik a shot at becoming the fourth man in tournament history to defend the Kitzbühel title, after Guillermo Vilas, Albert Costa and Robin Haase, and snaps a run in which the Kazakh had won his last five finals.
It also completes a rapid turnaround in the pair’s rivalry: Halys beat Bublik in the second round in Gstaad last week and has now done it again on the biggest stage of his career. Halys had also beaten Yannick Hanfmann in the semi-finals to reach his first ATP Tour final since losing in Gstaad back in 2024.
Halys becomes the first Frenchman to win Kitzbühel in seven attempts, with his compatriots having gone 0-6 in finals here before him, and the ninth first-time champion on tour this season. The result will lift him from No. 83 to No. 51 in the world rankings, edging him back toward the top 50 for the first time in over a year, on the back of a season that has also included his first Top 10 win, over Andrey Rublev in Dubai last year.
