In the battle for a final berth, Stefanos Tsitsipas prevailed over Lorenzo Musetti 4-6, 6-3, 6-0 at the Open Parc Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes Lyon on Saturday. The Greek awaits the winner of Cameron Norrie and Karen Khachanov.
"I had to stay calm," Tsitsipas said on court. "It was difficult to be a set down and have to kind of refresh myself and come anew in the second set. He was still putting [in] a lot of work and making me work for every single point. It wasn’t easy."
Tsitsipas improves to 2-0 in his ATP Head2Head Series against Musetti and now leads the ATP Tour with 32 wins. Sitting at a career-high ranking of No. 5 in the FedEx ATP Rankings, he picked up his sixth title, and first ATP Masters 1000, at the Rolex Monte-Carlo Masters before reaching the final at the Barcelona Open Banc Sabadell.
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Despite the grandness of the occasion, Musetti showed no signs of nerves in the first set, breaking at 2-2 and showing off his wide array of shots. With Tsitsipas hanging back far behind the baseline, Musetti was effective in hitting drop shot after drop shot.
Tsitsipas stayed calm and took control in the second set, while Musetti couldn't maintain his level. After Tsitsipas broke at love for 5-3, he didn’t lose another game, racing to the finish line and into his 16th final.
"It was important I had a match like this," Tsitsipas said. "It makes me stay humble and focus on some detailed things I can potentially improve and get better at on clay."
Musetti is one of the newest and youngest faces inside of the Top 100 in the FedEx ATP Rankings. After a run to the Acapulco semi-finals, which ended at the hands of Tsitsipas, the 19-year-old Italian jumped from No. 120 to No. 94.
Musetti’s week in Lyon began as an alternate and he took out seventh seed Felix Auger-Aliassime in the first round and backed it up with wins over Sebastian Korda and Aljaz Bedene.
from Tennis - ATP World Tour https://ift.tt/3u8gWq5
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