Francisco Cerundolo is the newest Umag champion! The 25-year-old Argentinian player won the 34th Plava Laguna Croatia Open's final match on Saturday when he defeated Italy's Lorenzo Musetti (2:6, 6:4, 7:6 (5)), securing the third title in his career. He also became the third Argentinian player to win the title at Stella Maris, with Guillermo Cañas and Guillermo Coria winning the tournament in 2004 and 2005, respectively. This is his first title in Croatia, after winning at the ATP Challenger in Split in 2020.

„It was a great duel, with many ups and downs, an absolutely thrilling match. I wasn't aggressive enough at the start, but I managed to snatch the victory“, said Cerundolo, whose Umag title moved him from the 37th to the 26th place of the singles ATP rankings, not that far away from the best spot of his career (19th). When talking about the award ceremony, he added: “I didn't know we'd have fireworks, it was an amazing show. I loved it!“

At the start of the match, it didn’t seem that it would be so tied, since Musetti won the first set having lost only two games. The Argentinian opened the second set with 3:0, then lost his serve, but won a break in the tenth game, and brought everything back into balance. Both players were brilliant in the third set, the audience enjoyed some amazing tennis, and it seemed that Musetti took a decisive step towards victory when he won a break to take the lead at 5:4. However, Cerundolo fought back when the Italian player was serving for the match, and in the tie break the Argentinian took back the advantage and he was in the lead 3:1. Cerundolo turned it over yet again, winning six points in a row, and then it didn’t take him long to conclude the match.

The day before, in the semi-finals, Cerundolo defeated the top-seeded player, Russian Andrey Rublev, so on his road to winning this tournament title he had to defeat two top-seeded players. This is the third time this happened in Umag, after Félix Mantilla in 1997 and Pablo Cuevas in 2014.

“I made a mistake and didn’t stay on the same level I played on in the first set. There were some chances in the third, but tie breaks are like Russian roulette, it can go both ways. If nothing else, I can say I lost to a friend,” said Musetti.

There’s not much time for the players to celebrate their amazing achievements in Umag, as the first matches of the Olympic Games tournament in Paris are set to start on Sunday afternoon. Musetti faces off with France’s Gael Monfils, while Cerundolo will be challenged by Chilean player Marcelo Tomas Barrios Vera.