Zverev wins second Red Bull BassLine title

World number three tennis star emerges victorious from six players in front of 5,300 fans and live DJ music.

World number three tennis player Alexander Zverev secured his second Red Bull BassLine title in a row after a memorable night at the Vienna Stadthalle where freestyle player Stefan Bojic and BMX legend Matthias Dandois also entertained the crowd.

At BassLine, six players compete in two groups of three in a fun tie-break format with the best two athletes placed in two groups as group leaders according to their world ranking position then fans vote using interactive color bands which players will face them in each group.

Within the assigned group, each player plays against each other - a coin toss deciding which player begins to serve - and whoever gets five points first wins the set in this fast-paced round-robin best-of-three format.

There is no umpire, while there are player interviews and a DJ playing music between points along with chat from experts in the athletes' zone.

World number two Carlos Alcaraz won the first 2021 title in Vienna as a largely unknown player with Russian Karen Khachanov winning the 2022 event and Zverev the 2023 title after Russian Andrey Rublev defeated Casper Ruud to claim the first Red Bull BassLine Madrid title in April.

German Zverev was one of six men's players in action at the Vienna Stadthalle - home of this week's Erste Bank Open ATP event - alongside fellow top 50 global players Australian Alexei Popyrin plus Italians Flavio Cobolli and Matteo Berrettini.

The 5,300 record fans also cheered on local hero Joel Schwärzler and Japanese veteran Kei Nishikori as Berrettini prepared the crowd with some singing accompanied by live beats from DJ Instyle.

As defending champion, Zverev was the man to beat and he emerged from Group Blue after defeating Schwärzler in three sets, then gave Berrettini no chance in the deciding match for a final place.