Carlo Alberto Caniato unexpected protagonist at the San Marino Open

On Monday evening, the Internazionali di tennis – San Marino Open was the setting for the first ATP Challenger success of one of the emerging talents of Italian tennis, 19-year-old Carlo Alberto Caniato. Current number 689 in the rankings, the class of 2005 defeated on clay Frenchman Ugo Blanchet, number 8 in the seeding and 173rd in the ATP rankings.

7-6(5), 7-5 was the score in favor of the Ferrara-based tennis player, who was included in the tournament’s main draw as a wild card. Despite his very young age, Caniato showed veteran-like resilience in the first set, where he recovered from’1-3 to go on to win at the tie-break, then making himself the protagonist of an even more solid second fraction, where the difference was made in the very last games.

The first set was a good one.

Before Monday, Caniato had never won at the ATP Challenger circuit tournament level: in Modena, last June 29, he made it through the first round by taking advantage of Bernabé Zapata Miralles’ withdrawal due to injury, at 5-5 during the first set. After elimination at the first match in the next tournament, on July 6 in Trieste against Dodig, came the’opportunity of the San Marino Open, exploited to overcome himself.

Caniato is no stranger to important matches in this 2025, although the most significant success came in doubles, in the first round of the Rome tournament: together with Federico Bondioli, in fact, the 19-year-old defeated Simone Bolelli and Andrea Vavassori, who a couple of weeks later would go on to win in Hamburg their third tournament of the year, after those in Adelaide and Rotterdam.