Italy goes back to seeing red. In Gstaad, where Matteo Berrettini puts behind him the damn stop for covid that denied him the green of Wimbledon, and recovering “at Berrettini” a match that seemed lost against the Spaniard Pedro Martinez, he reaches the semifinals. And on the even more noble fields of the Rothenbaum in Hamburg, which saw Lorenzo Musetti clearly triumph over the Monte-Carlo finalist, the other Spaniard Alex Davidovich-Fokina and enter the last four of the German ATP 500. Lorenzo after the burning defeat in five sets against Tsitsipas in Paris had imposed himself in the Challenger of Forlì, but came from four consecutive first rounds in Stuttgart, Queen’s, Wimbledon and Baastad. A season for now made of ups and downs, his, with the quarterfinals in Monte-Carlo and Barcelona, then the final in Madrid from which he had to withdraw due to an injury that prevented him from playing in Rome, and a tiring come back in. But the “Muse” now seems fully recovered. Playing a match of great quality, he won against Davidovich-Fokina, 35 Atp, 6-4 6-3 and tomorrow he will face the Argentine Francisco Cerundolo, who in turn eliminated the Russian Aslan Karatsev. It is his first semifinal of the year in a “500”, the second in his career, and from Monday he will enter the top 50 for the first time, the 28th blue to do so in the Open era.
Matteo Berrettini instead tomorrow in Gstaad will have to contend with the revived Dominic Thiem, the Austrian who seemed destined to collect the legacy of the Fab Four but after the success at the Us Open in 2020 he entered a negative spiral made up of injuries – on the wrist – and depression that had precipitated him from number 3 to number 352 in the world. 440 days after his last ATP semifinal, climbed up to n.274 and on the field thanks to a wild card, he is again among the “last four” of a tournament, opposed to an opponent who also had to live with a non-trivial dose of jella. Matteo, who slipped to 15 Atp, returned to the race in Gstaad, taking his eleventh victory in the season after his successes in Stuttgart and Queen’s and his debut in Switzerland. Against Martinez he gave yet another proof of his mental strength: under 6-3 and 5-1 in the tie-break of the second set he found his best tennis one step away from defeat, recovering to win 7-5 in the tie- break and then dominating in the third (3-6 7-6 6-1). In Gstaad, it should be remembered, in 2019 Berrettini won both singles and doubles. «Tennis is a crazy sport. It was over at 1-1 in the tie-break », he admitted. “Then I played two good points and on 3-5 and I thought ‘let’s try.” I don’t think I’ve played my best match here, but sometimes it’s important to win when you don’t play well. I managed to find some energy inside of me and I’m really happy I made it. Thiem? He’s a Grand Slam champion, he’s injured but he’s coming back. I saw some of his exchanges today and his level is returning to what it used to be. The two of us always play great games ( Matteo is ahead 3-2 in the previous, ndr), so I expect it to be tomorrow too ».