Musetti digs deep to survive Turin's pressure cooker

In the humming intensity of Turin's Pala Alpitour, Lorenzo Musetti transformed exhaustion into exhilaration during the Lorenzo Musetti showdown at the Nitto ATP Finals. Just 30 hours removed from a straight-sets loss, the 23-year-old Italian faced Alex de Minaur in a match that stretched to two hours and 47 minutes, ending 7-5, 3-6, 7-5. Buoyed by waves of home support crashing over every point, he clawed back from 3-5 in the decider, breaking serve with a forehand winner on the run to seal his maiden victory at the event and shift to 1–1 in the Jimmy Connors Group.

Revival sparked by baseline fire

Musetti arrived shadowed by fatigue from his earlier defeat to Taylor Fritz, his strokes initially tentative against De Minaur's quicksilver retrievals. But as the first set tightened at 5-5, he rediscovered his rhythm, deploying inside-out forehands to stretch the Australian wide and following with crosscourt backhands that pinned him deep. The crowd's chants swelled with each fist pump, fueling a break sealed by a down-the-line pass that left De Minaur lunging in vain, setting the tone for a night where mental grit overrode physical strain.

In the second set, De Minaur's intensity surged, his flat returns neutralizing Musetti's one–two patterns and forcing errors on stretched inside-in attempts. The Italian faded momentarily, his footwork slowing under the indoor hard court's relentless pace, but the home energy kept him anchored, preventing a full collapse. This resilience hinted at deeper changes, honed through a season of high-stakes adaptation.

Epic rally ignites decider momentum

The third set unfolded as a tactical duel, with De Minaur serving for the match at 5-3, his crosscourt returns keeping Musetti on the defensive. At 4–3, 30/30, a grueling 31-shot rally captured the arena's pulse: De Minaur unleashed a forehand tweener that had both players sprawling on the court, the crowd erupting in a mix of gasps and cheers. Though he dropped the point, Musetti rose with renewed purpose, breaking back immediately by varying underspin slices to disrupt his opponent's flat-hitting rhythm and opening the court for weighty forehand drives.

Riding this surge, the Italian held serve under mounting pressure, his kick serves wide to the deuce side drawing De Minaur forward into vulnerable positions. The hard surface's true bounce amplified his flatter shots in clutch exchanges, turning potential defeat into dominance as fist pumps synchronized with the roaring stands. This shift not only evened the group standings—where all four players remain in semifinal contention—but also marked Musetti's third straight win over De Minaur, extending his earlier clay triumphs at Monte-Carlo and Madrid into a hard-court milestone, his first against a top-10 foe this season.

Season grind builds Alcaraz challenge

Musetti's 2025 breakout, with finals in Monte-Carlo, Chengdu, and Athens last week, has yielded a 45–21 record, eclipsing his prior high of 40 tour-level wins. De Minaur, the 26-year-old who lifted the Washington ATP 500 trophy and reached Rotterdam's final, absorbed the loss to sit at 0-2, his counterpunching blunted by the Italian's deeper positioning and spin variations. Transformed from his Fritz encounter, Musetti buzzed the baseline with piercing groundstrokes, a product of offseason mental tuning that turns fatigue into focus.

Looking ahead to Thursday's clash with Carlos Alcaraz, the world No. 1 who's 2-0 after beating De Minaur and Fritz while chasing a first Nitto ATP Finals title, Musetti eyes another upset. The Spaniard's explosive variety on hard courts will test these adjustments—perhaps more slice approaches to slow the tempo and exploit recovery gaps—but the Italian's warrior ethos, forged in pressure, positions him to weave crowd fervor into a tactical edge. With qualification still fluid, this Turin survival signals a contender ready to push limits against the elite, one passionate point at a time.