Alexander Zverev reached the round of 16 at the ATP Masters in Rome. A possible top opponent on the way to winning the tournament, however, is out: Novak Djokovic surprisingly lost.
Zverev beat local hero Luciano Darderi on Sunday (May 12th, 2024) after an initial struggle with 7:6 (7:3), 6:2 in 1:49 hours. In the round of 16, the Olympic tennis champion will face Nuno Borges Portugal. The German number one, tournament winner in Rome in 2017, confidently eliminated the Australian Aleksandar Vukic at the start (6:0, 6:4).
“He’s young, he’s up-and-coming. I don’t know what the Italians get to eat, they have a lot of strong young players,” Zverev joked afterwards. “It’s going well so far, the opponents will be tougher.”
WTA; 3rd round arrow right ATP; 3. Round arrow right
In the first set, neither Zverev nor Darderi gave a service, the world number five won the tiebreak. In the second set, Zverev managed the break to make it 3-1, after which the Italian’s resistance was broken. Zverev used his first match point.
Zverev is not yet in top form – like Djokovic
The 27-year-old is still looking for form before the French Open, which begins on May 20th. At the Masters in Madrid last week, Zverev failed in the round of 16 against Argentinian Francisco Cerundolo. His last tournament victory was last September. In Rome, apart from Zverev, from a German perspective, only Dominik Koepfer (meets Tommy Paul on Monday) is in the running.
Djokovic had previously suffered a bitter setback two weeks before the start of the French Open. The 24-time Grand Slam tournament winner from Serbia deservedly lost 2:6, 3:6 against the Chilean Alejandro Tabilo at the Masters 1000 tournament in Rome on Sunday (May 12, 2024) and was surprisingly eliminated in the third round out of.
“Several minor errors”
The top seed Djokovic was far from his top form before the second Grand Slam tournament of the year; the 36-year-old made a number of slight mistakes. Tellingly, Djokovic ended the match after just 67 minutes with a double fault on his own serve.
His opponent, who was ten years his junior, took advantage of the opportunity and played tactically cleverly. Tabilo became the first Chilean since 2007 to defeat a world number one. At that time, Fernando González beat the Swiss Roger Federer at the ATP finals. “This is crazy, I can’t believe it,” said Tabilo, who will now face Russian Karen Khachanov in the round of 16.
Hit in the head by a bottle
The trip to Rome was also a failure for Djokovic this year off the pitch. After his win on Friday evening against Frenchman Corentin Moutet, he was hit by a bottle while signing autographs and fell to the ground. “It was an accident and I’m fine, I’m resting in the hotel with an ice pack,” the Serb wrote on “X” on Saturday night.
The organizers of the clay court tournament in the Italian capital announced that Djokovic had been treated with appropriate medication. A statement said that the drinking bottle had probably accidentally fallen on the six-time winner of the tournament and was not thrown at him on purpose. Video footage showed the bottle slipping out of a spectator’s pocket.