As proud Carrarino, a Lorenzo Musetti the words are not lacking. Sometimes he exaggerated, and no one was surprised in a city that was an important center of Italian anarchy, which was by definition atheist. Between the nineteenth and the last century, in the squares, in the taverns and in the clubs of Carrara, politics was conducted by shouting and swearing, the miners’ demonstrations and meetings were a school of rough and popular speech. We don’t know what words went through Lollo’s head at the end of his match against Alex de Minaur, who could have lost but instead won 7-5 3-6 7-5 after almost three grueling hours, but we can imagine.
On Saturday he showed his absolute value in a beautiful final despite losing to Novak Djokovic at the ATP 250 in Athens. Yesterday, because she was so tired, she had to give up to Taylor Fritz in two sets. Tonight he revealed in a few moments the same sparkling game that allowed him to place himself, at the top of the final climb, among the eight Grand Masters of Turin.
Excluding the opening few games, with practically no rallies due to the prevalence of serving efficiency in both games, the match was in my opinion one of the most even, hard-fought and entertaining of these Nitto ATP Finals. His opponent’s almost thirty hours longer break – de Minaur surrendered in his match against Carlos Alcaraz on Sunday afternoon – could have been the deciding factor for the Australian, and instead in the third set Musetti continued to believe that he could recover the break he suffered at the start, and in the end he did so thanks to two consecutive breaks. On the pitch he thanked the public, and tonight there were no words of courtesy. Without the support of the fifteen thousand people present in the stands, he would have definitely been eliminated from the tournament. On the other hand, he still has a chance to qualify for the semifinals. On Thursday he will play Carlos Alcaraz, who today struggled to overcome Fritz (6-7 7-5 6-3).
There are words and sayings, some painful, some soothing. Piers Morgan is one of the most popular British journalists, from a media genre that bypasses the late tabloid tabloid direction Word News and it Sun for the role of judge on Britain’s Got Talent. Now he runs his own channel on YouTube called, you guessed it, “Piers Morgan Uncensored,” with over four million subscribers. Interview only popular people, preferably global people. His last interlocutors in chronological order were Novak Djokovic. While waiting to see the entire video, we read today at the agency’s launch that the former world No. 1 will tell Morgan, referring to the Clostebol affair that tormented Jannik Sinner’s life for a year, that “clouds will follow forever” the Italian champion, as well as “the cloud of Covid will follow me”. No need to translate. So, taken out of the context of an hour-long interview, they are sentences that can lead to misjudgments, so embroidering them only increases the volume of the social media frenzy, where millions of lazy people spend their time.
If he’s in Turin these days, we’ll have to ask the former ATP No. The nine-time champion from Melbourne was consumed by global criticism, but personally I almost forgot about it, so much so that I never wrote a line about it. Other colleagues who admire Nole as much as I do also do the same. Then why bring it back up and involve Jannik too? How unpleasant it would be if tomorrow night, in the press conference after the match against Alexander Zverev, someone raised the issue of Clostebol, which should be left to those addicted to poisonous gossip about X and the like.
Playing tennis is more fun than excessive words. In doubles, early in the day, Simone Bolelli and Andrea Vavassori they gained, by playing so well, early access to the semi-finals of the ATP Finals by beating the number 3 seed, the Spaniard, 7-6 6-4 Marcel Granollers and the Argentine player Horacio Zeballosboth are around forty years old like the Bolognese (the only “young” player on the field is a native of Turin, born in 1995). Busy away from the Inalpi Arena, I followed the live video on my cellphone but the enthusiasm of the audience was still felt. Doubles, which is more widely played in tennis circles than singles, is a very spectacular sport that sooner or later will also get adequate media space. Like almost all the protagonists of the new wave of Italian tennis, Simone and Andrea have personal stories and styles based on understatements that are not newsworthy but nevertheless provide a positive sensation to those who follow them. We should not expect revelations or proclamations from them, but rather common sense. Here, without attribution, are the highlights of what they said in the press conference after the win: “Our goal was to put more energy into every exchange, trying to always stay united, always with eyes in the eye. This was the key. We played two incredible games, today even better than the first, on Sunday (against the number 1 seed, ed.). We can’t wait for the third game to arrive.” For frills, and for gratuitous verbal nastiness, go elsewhere
