Lorenzo Musetti, bitter confession after Jannik Sinner boom.
Lorenzo Musetti is preparing to make a comeback at the Internazionali d’Italia, the tournament that a year ago saw him reach the semifinals before a loss to Carlos Alcaraz. “I’m coming here to Rome definitely with fewer matches than last year and with less confidence, no use hiding it. However, as I already said in the press conference, the fact that there is the Roman or at least the Italian public I think is a huge advantage to be exploited.”
The 2002 class emphasizes to Eurosport how much the support of the public can affect his performance, especially that of the younger ones: “I would love to feel a lot of affection from the fans and especially the little ones: they are the ones who make me wake up every morning and push me to always look for the best, as a player and as a boy. I also play for them, hopefully I will surprise myself and surprise them.”
Among the most vivid memories of his growing up is the match he played on May 8, 2019 against Sinner in the pre-qualifying rounds of the Roman tournament, a match that then already represented the future of Italian tennis. Musetti does not forget one specific episode: “The match point I had, cancelled by Jannik. It was a very good match, fought, there was hype. It was kind of the match that everyone was waiting for.”
That day it was Sinner who got the better of me, blurring the wild-card dream for Musetti: “Jannik managed to beat me by playing a very good third set, and I remember that blurring the chance to have the wild-card in the draw, which would have been a dream for me. Many years have passed, now I look back and I have a good memory of that match with Jan.”
“Definitely Jannik has opened a really new path, if we want to call it that, especially in Italian tennis. What he is doing and what he has already done is something that no one had ever done in Italy.”
“I think it’s a very good thing. The reference is inevitably to Sinner’s extraordinary results, which have raised expectations around the entire Italian movement: “Let’s say that the standard of judgment of people, fans and insiders has been raised a lot. And obviously that’s something I feel. Despite being No. 5 in the world, having reached the quarters in all the Slams and made two Slam semifinals, the first thing I hear is that Lorenzo Musetti hasn’t won a title in four years. Definitely that’s something that’s going around in my head a little bit. Then there have been so many finals over the years, so it’s not so easy to be the second. You move on, though.”
