It’s arduous to place a constructive spin on Lorenzo Musetti dropping to Novak Djokovic at Roland Garros—once more—in 5 units after having a lead—once more—after Djokovic appeared flat and/or uninterested for vital phases of the match—once more. After three units, Musetti led 5-7, 7-6, 6-2 and had Djokovic, a legendarily tireless baseliner, making kamikaze rushes to the online to finish factors as quickly as doable to appease his flagging cardio. With that in thoughts, Musetti will most likely endure an unhealthy variety of sleepless nights questioning how this match bought away. But I need to attempt to reward him right here.
In the fourth spherical of the 2021 event, a 19-year-old Musetti bought his first shot at Djokovic and shockingly took the primary two units from him, profitable each in tiebreaks. Djokovic reeled off 16 of the following 17 video games, and down 4-0 within the fifth set, Musetti give up the match and shook fingers with Djokovic then and there. The assumption was that he was damage, however in his post-match press convention, Musetti admitted that he wasn’t significantly injured; he simply threw within the towel as a result of he couldn’t win factors anymore.
Down 4-0 within the fifth set of the match on Saturday evening, having blown one other lead (albeit a two-sets-to-one benefit fairly than 2-0 this time), Musetti will need to have been fed up with Djokovic, with tennis, and with the entire goddamn world. He’s had a rocky three years for the reason that 2021 indignity—occasional highs like wins over Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz on the best-of-three degree, however much more extended and puzzling lows. However, he’d persevered, he’d gotten his Djokovic rematch, and he’d proven higher stamina and extra consistency, even making tennis’s GOAT look jarringly peculiar for giant components of the primary three units. Despite all of that, he was again in the very same place as when he give up three years in the past.
Musetti misplaced the fifth set, 6-0. Djokovic lastly settled into his killer-robot mode and stopped making errors whilst he hit nuclear forehands to minuscule targets on the corners of the court docket. Musetti may do nothing however placed on a courageous face.
For what it’s value, I assumed he wore the masks convincingly. At 4-0, 30-love within the deciding fifth set, Musetti tried a drop shot. Djokovic dashed as much as it and replied with certainly one of his personal: a cuter, spinnier ball that bounced low and brief within the court docket. There was no sensible level in chasing it, as far behind as Musetti was. But he tailed after the ball, fulfilling the unreasonable expectations of all sports activities followers to by some means strive more durable when a win is extra hopeless, and located a shocking angle for a crosscourt backhand winner. Djokovic gave him a thumbs-up.
Later within the recreation, with Djokovic one level away from 5-0, he bought Musetti on the run. Go right here, puppet, then there, then right here once more. Given up on a contented existence but? Musetti made two nice will get in his backhand nook. Then, after a dash throughout the court docket, he by some means delivered an atomic forehand winner on the useless run that slotted via a spot in Djokovic’s defenses nearly one tennis ball broad. In a delightfully pissy gesture, Djokovic coated his eyes and mimed hitting a forehand, to say that Musetti’s winner was one solely pure hope and luck may have produced. Maybe so. But Musetti made it doable by struggling via the primary few pictures of the rally.
Djokovic closed out the sport for 5-0, then leveled up but once more for the coup de grace, blistering higher returns off of Musetti’s first serves than he had been hitting on second serves for the primary three-and-a-half units. On match level, Djokovic smacked a crosscourt forehand return winner previous his defeated opponent—a shot Djokovic grew to become immediately well-known for when he hit it to save match level towards Roger Federer on the U.S. Open greater than a decade in the past.
On the one hand, Musetti had three years to prep for this match, figuring out full properly what Djokovic was able to, and misplaced to a person who has barely appeared like himself this 12 months. (Djokovic hasn’t received a event in 2024 and may, at 37, be lastly coming into a significant decline.) Yet Musetti let one other huge lead go and once more light badly as Djokovic, 15 years older, displayed the superior conditioning.
On the opposite hand, Musetti by no means give up, even when issues appeared simply as bleak as they did three years in the past. His unbelievable winners dragged out proceedings within the fifth set so as to add a tiny bit extra distress to Djokovic’s evening; Novak screamed in celebration when he lastly killed off the 4-0 recreation. Despite the scoreline (and possibly issues occurred so quick that he was just a bit dazed), Musetti didn’t throw a tantrum or reduce his effort within the slightest.
The idea of “fighting”—refusing to lose quietly—comes up quite a bit in tennis, sometimes in reverential tones as a participant’s effort is praised. While I can respect a late-game push, I additionally assume {that a} need to battle is a reasonably frequent ingredient on the high of the game. Most gamers on tour are glorious at not giving up; at these tournaments, those that are nice fighters far outweigh these with a status for being a shitty competitor.
What is most spectacular to me is a participant preventing when a comeback is clearly mission inconceivable. Maintaining a excessive degree of effort when there’s completely no purpose to need to proceed strikes me as probably the most troublesome factor, notably in a sport the place there aren’t any teammates to carry you up. Musetti knew he was toast at 4-0. Nothing he may do would have turned that loss right into a win. Yet he tried anyway, as a result of that’s the expectation for skilled tennis gamers. Sebastian Korda did one thing related in his third-round loss to Alcaraz—all through a decent second set, Korda was fist-pumping, yelling, and going toe-to-toe with the golden boy. When he misplaced that set, he visibly deflated. In the third, Korda stopped celebrating vocally and stopped chasing Alcaraz’s drop pictures. But when Korda served at 1-4 and Alcaraz began urgent for yet one more break of serve, Korda determined to dig in and ended up escaping with the sport. It didn’t assist him. He misplaced the match in precisely the identical method one would anticipate from that place. But I’ll keep in mind what he did.
Musetti shouldn’t have to hold his head. He performed three-and-a-half good units towards the most effective to ever do it, didn’t give up when the GOAT began enjoying like himself, and in the long run bought incinerated by simply in regards to the highest degree of tennis possible. Everyone related on tour has suffered that destiny sooner or later. Musetti most likely will really feel like shit, as a result of he had his foot on Djokovic’s neck and couldn’t full the most important win of his profession. But if tennis followers name him a disappointment for a efficiency like that, we may be setting the bar too rattling excessive.
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