Stefanos Tsitsipas Shines Bright with Hat-Trick Victory in Monte Carlo

MONTE-CARLO, Monaco – Stefanos Tsitsipas hasn’t flashed his radiant smile for months, but on Sunday by winning his third title in Monte Carlo he proved to himself and to the world that he deserved a place in the elite.

He has just hit a final winning forehand which seals his victory 6-1, 6-4 against the Norwegian Casper Ruud: lying on his back on his blessed land, he takes a quick look at his clan, his father Apostolos and his mother Julia Salnikova who won the junior tournament in 1981 under the colors of the USSR.

Then he gets up and falls into the arms of his opponent before wiping a few tears in his napkin while waiting for the awards ceremony.

“It’s incredible to taste victory again… There is a god up there! », Commented the 25-year-old Greek who won his first Masters 1000 on the same Rainier III court in 2021, before achieving the double in 2022.

“I really wanted this hat-trick,” he said, ensuring that this third victory represented even more than the first two.

Stefanos Tsitsipas

“Without mercy”

He thus became the fifth player in the Open era (since 1968) to register his name on the tournament list at least three times, after Ilie Nastase (3), Björn Borg (3), Thomas Muster (3) and Rafael Nadal (11).

Double finalist in Grand Slam (Roland-Garros 2021 and Australian Open 2023), Tsitspas won the 11th title of his career on Sunday, his first of the season, at the end of a very convincing journey since he eliminated three players of the world top-10: Alexander Zverev (5th) in the round of 16, Jannik Sinner (2nd) in the semi and Ruud in the final.

“I am very happy to have played incredible and merciless tennis,” he relished.

After the stands had emptied, he was still like a child jumping, trophy in hand in the middle of the court, surrounded by all the ball boys of the tournament who were singing “olé olé olé Tsitsipas”.

Their champion had not beaten a player as highly ranked as Sinner on clay since his victory against Daniil Medvedev (2nd) at Roland Garros in 2021. And he had not played in a Masters 1000 final on this surface since Rome in 2022. Enough to fall back to 12th in the world, he who was 3rd in 2021.

Deserved top-10

But with this first title since Los Cabos in 2023, he will return to the world top-10 on Monday after eight weeks of absence: he will move up to 7th place thanks to this 100th victory on clay.

“You love this tournament and you played really well all week. You deserve to get back into the top 10,” Ruud told him at the trophy ceremony.

Former world No. 2, the Norwegian will move up to sixth place on Monday, his best ranking since September 2023. He fails for the second time in the Masters 1000 final after Miami (2022) and extends his series of lost finals in a row to five ( after Roland-Garros 2023, Bastad 2023, Los Cabos 2024 and Acapulco 2024).

Three times a Grand Slam finalist (Roland-Garros 2022 and 2023, US Open 2023), he has won ten tournaments to date, but none above the ATP 250 category. He therefore remains in search of a very big title .

However, he leaves Monte-Carlo with the greatest victory of his career, obtained in the semi-finals when he beat world No. 1 Novak Djokovic from whom he had never taken a single set in five meetings.

2024-04-14 14:53:00
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