Matteo Berrettini aims to qualify for the Nitto ATP Finals for the second time in three years and play at the end-of-season tournament at the Pala Alpitour in Turin from 14 to 21 November 2021.
Berrettini started the 2019 season at world number 54 spot in the ATP Ranking and enjoyed the best year of his career winning two ATP titles in Budapest on clay and Stuttgart on grass. He held in all 50 of his service games in Stuttgart and won the final beting Felix Auger Aliassime. The 25-year-old Rome native player reached his first ATP 500 semifinal in Halle, his first Masters 1000 semifinal in Shanghai and his first Grand Slam semifinal at the US Open. He beat Gael Monfils in fifth-set tie-break in the quarter final before losing to Rafael Nadal in the semifinal. He became the second Italian player in history to reach the US Open semifinal and the fourth a Major semifinal after Corrado Barazzutti, Marco Cecchinato and Adriano Panatta.
Berrettini broke into the top 10 on 28 October 2019 and reached his career-high number 8 on 4 November. He became the highest ranked Italian player and the first ATP Finals qualifier from Italy since Corrado Barazzutti in 1978. Berrettini attended the 2020 edition as an alternate.
“It would be great to qualify for Turin. It is in Italy. Turin is a great city and I think it is going to be a great event. London was unbelievable. It was a nice way to finish the year. I remember all my team and all my family was there. A lot of people came and it was nice. It would be nice to be there in Turin too but I think I have to go step by step. At the beginning of 2019, I didn’t think about that, so I have to think tournament by tournament”, said Berrettini to the ATP Tour website.
Italian tennis is enjoying a good era, as eight players are ranked in the top 100. It’s one of the only two countries to have four players inside the top 40 (Berrettini, 2019 Monte-Carlo champion Fabio Fognini, 2020 Vienna finalist Lorenzo Sonego and 2019 Next Gen Finals champion Jannik Sinner).
“It is something that we should be really proud of. All the players are really nice guys and there are others coming. It is a really healthy environment for tennis in Italy. The guys are great, Lorenzo Sonego, Jannik Sinner, Fabio Fognini and also the other guys. We have fun when we practise together. We are helping each other to reach our goals and I think this is something really healthy and really great for tennis”.
Berrettini played in just six tournaments in 2020 due to injury problems and the suspension of the tour due to the Covid-19 pandemic. He reached the Australian Open second round and the third round at Roland Garros. He lost to Andrey Rublev in the fourth round of the 2020 US Open one year after beating the Russian player in the same tournament. At Masters 1000 tournaments he lost to Reilly Opelka in the Western and Southern Open in New York and to Casper Ruud in the quarter final in Rome.
“Once you get to the top 10, you cannot say: ‘Okay, I am going to be happy if I am top 20’. Obviously it is not bad at all. When I was younger and I was thinking about myself being top 20. I was like: ‘Okay, it could be a nice goal for my career’. I was top 8 and obviously I am chasing to be even better, but I got there without thinking about it. It is in my head, but I have to work every day and hopefully I can improve my ranking”.Berrettini reached the quarter final in Antalya in his first tournament of the 2021 season.
He will play in the second edition of the ATP Cup in Melbourne with Fabio Fognini, Simone Bolelli and Andrea Vavassori in the build-up to the Australian Open. Italy has been drawn in an all-European Group C with Austria and France. Austria will be led by Dominic Thiem. The four group winners will advance to the semifinals.
