The 2022 tennis season has entered the competition for the clay season, in the final of the ATP1000 Series Masters Monte Carlo Tournament that ended first, the defending champion Tsitsipas performed well, defeating the big dark horse Fokina in two straight sets 6-3, 7-6, successfully achieving the defending title and winning the second Masters men's singles title of his career, Tsitsipas, who has shown his clay strength last season, will be the biggest opponent in the next Nadal French Open.
There have been many new developments this season, with Nadal's unprepared Australian Open taking the cup and then starting with a career-best 20-game winning streak, but ending the indo-final defeat to Fritz. Next is the clay season that Nadal is good at, although he has always been the king of clay but lost to Djokovic in the semi-finals of the French Open last season, which has made many variables in the clay race this season, but Djokovic is trapped in the absence of the Australian Open and has plummeted, and the task of challenging Nadal's clay supremacy has been entrusted to the new generation of kings Tsitsipas.
Tsitsipas has proved his clay strength last season, reaching the final final in one fell swoop at the French Open, the station Moncasse as the defending champion out, the road to the promotion performance is strong, consecutive victories over Fognini, Jerry, Schwartzman and Zverev jr., in the final Tsitsipas encountered the big dark horse Fokina, the latter eliminated Deyo in the first round, and then won consecutive victories over Fritz and Dimitrov, reaching the men's singles final of the Masters for the first time in his career.
In the first set, each set saved a 1-1 draw at the beginning of the game, Fudkina took the lead in the third set to get a 40-15 consecutive break point to complete the break, and in the fourth set, Tsitsipas quickly counterattacked and scored four consecutive points to break the 2-2 draw. In the next round of their respective saves, Tsitsipas once again forced out the break point in the eighth set at the end of the set, and the classic SLR straight-line winning point broke, and won the first set 6-3 with the trend.
In the second set, Tsitsipas quickly established an advantage in the opening stages, breaking the band to protect the opening of the game to take a 2-0 lead, and Fudkina quickly completed the return score to draw 2-2. In the ninth set, Tsitsipas again won the break point and successfully cashed in, And Fawkina did not give up his efforts, and then successfully broke the opponent's serve to win the game, and the score came to 5-5. Each saved a 6-6 draw, grabbed the seven Tsitsipas all the way ahead, and won the second set 7-3 to win the second set.
In the end, Tsitsipas defeated Falkina 2-0 on aggregate to successfully defend the Monte Carlo championship, the fourth player in history to successfully defend the title in this event. The whole game took 1 hour and 36 minutes, Tsitsipas completed 3 ACES goals and 1 double error, a success rate of 74% of a shot, a 71% scoring rate of each shot, and 4 breaks on 6 break points in the breakage link.
Nadal Clay's biggest opponent is produced
Nadal is the undisputed king of clay, and although Djokovic beat Nadal in the semi-finals last season, Federer and Djokovic in the Big Three are almost unable to compete with Nadal on clay, and in recent seasons, the new generation of Thiem has been challenging. Now, with Thiem sidelined for a long time due to injury, Tsitsipas has become another player who broke out on clay, winning the Monca race and the runner-up in Madrid last season, and since then reaching the Grand Slam final for the first time at the French Open.
Tsitsipas will be Nadal's biggest threat in clay this season, excellent running and single-handed super attack are the means of scoring, and have gained confidence on clay, coupled with the 2021 Australian Open has a wonderful performance against Nadal to let two and three, if Roland Garros and the two meet again, the older Nadal is unlikely to have a certain victory.