There was a day that, without realizing it, changed the 2024 season in professional padel. A day in which Galán and Chingotto, despite having won, lost. A final that was a turning point and that has caused everything that followed, because The dominance that Coello and Tapia currently impose has its origins in Italyin a final that marked them forever.
The new ‘Classic’ of padel was and continues to be ‘Chingalán’ against the ‘Golden Boys’. A final that was repeated tournament after tournament and that gave us a real great game every time they met. Since the ‘Mouse’ and the ‘Alien’ got together, he seemed to have taken advantage of the number one couple. The balance fell in their favor after the first confrontations, in a dynamic that had its peak in the P2 of Genoa.
Alejandro Galán and Fede Chingotto celebrating the Genoa title.
Once again, they met again in the fight for a title, but this time the script was different. Couple two gave it a real bath on the court, with a 6-1/6-1 that made them the best duo of the moment. That beating made Tapia and Coello reflectwho changed their strategy (especially with Chingotto) to return to the path of victory.
Genoa was the tournament that made us wake up
Since then they have not lost a game. There are four tournaments and four trophies that they have taken homein what is a spectacular streak of results and games. In fact, even Arturo Coello recognizes in a podcast (Pádel Break) that the defeat on Italian soil was fundamental to changing things. “It is the most important tournament of 2024. It is the one that makes us wake up, set off the alarms that we were not doing something right and that we had to reverse it”assured the man from Valladolid.
No margin of error
Just after Genoa, Malaga arrived and there they did not forgive the one, who took revenge with a 6-2/6-3. However, neither of the two main couples signed up for Finland, so they arrived at the break with enough time to prepare a mini-preseason for the second part of the year.
Tapia and Coello, unstoppable in Rotterdam.
From those weeks of rest, Coello and Tapia returned much strongerwho were absolutely unstoppable in P1 in Madrid. Next was Rotterdam, where a 6-2/6-2 in the final showed the biggest difference there has ever been between the two.. Since they got together, Galán and Chingotto have reached all the finals, but after the tournament in the Netherlands it seemed that they were far from winning tournaments again.
In Valladolid they closed the gap again, with a clash that went to three sets and it gave the feeling that they are more or less equal again. Even so, the one was crowned once againputting the fourth consecutive tournament in their showcases since that final in Genoa.
Before Madrid there were those who did accounts for number one at the end of the seasonbut these three tests leave the fight is very far away for Galán and Chingottowho would have to win practically everything and wait for Coello and Tapia to stumble. Something that seems almost impossible. Miracles exist, but they will have to start in Paris, at the Roland Garros Major if they want the fight for the world padel throne to have excitement until the end of the season.
