Matteo Berrettini returns to the court: he will start the Hangzhou ATP 250
Matteo Berrettini announces his return to the court after an absence of more than two months. The Roman tennis player, currently No. 58 in the world rankings, will be at the start of the Lynk & Co Hangzhou Open, an ATP 250 tournament scheduled on Chinese cement from Sept. 17-23. The’former top 10 player made his participation official through a video posted on Instagram, where he shows himself busy training and explains that it is “final preparation for Hangzhou”.
According to the tournament’s entry list, Berrettini is expected to be the eighth seed in the competition, which will feature the likes of Andrey Rublev, Daniil Medvedev, Alexander Bublik and defending champion Marin Cilic at the start. For the Roman, this will be the first tournament after a long series of forfeits that have characterized his 2025 season.
Berrettini’s last appearance was in fact in the first round of Wimbledon, where he was defeated in five sets by Kamil Majchrzak of Poland. After that match he had stated, “Honestly this is not the way I want to be on the court. I need to take some time and think about my future”. Since then came five consecutive withdrawals: the ATP 250s in Gstaad and Kitzbühel, where he was defending titles won in 2024, the Masters 1000s in Toronto and Cincinnati, and finally the U.S. Open.
The US Open.
This long absence has weighed heavily on Berrettini’s ranking, who has slipped out of the top 50 after being a major player in world tennis for years. He had shown signs of recovery in 2024 by winning three tournaments and contributing decisively to Italy’s encore in the Davis Cup, but physical problems have come back to haunt him in the current season.
The FIT president has also been a member of the FIT team.
FITP president Angelo Binaghi had recently expressed his closeness to the Roman tennis player: “Italian tennis needs him, that the sport needs Matteo Berrettini. It is important to recover Matteo for the Davis Cup team, but also for our movement, for the great results he has made on the court”. During the summer, Berrettini had been training in Monte Carlo together with Jannik Sinner, a sign that had given hope for his recovery.
The return to the court in Hangzhou thus represents a crucial moment for Berrettini’s career, as he aims to regain continuity and move up in the world rankings ahead of the most important events of the fall season.
