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The Monte Carlo Country Club, home of our sister tournament the Rolex Monte Carlo Masters, is built on the side of a cliff and looks out to the Mediterranean Sea, while behind the club the imposing cliffs reach for the sky. The location is stunningly beautiful and, on a picture-perfect day weather wise, hang gliders spread their wings and take off from the top of these cliffs.
However, finals day of this year's tournament was not one of the picture-perfect days. It was heavily overcast; there was very low cloud over the cliffs and rain was in the forecast from the afternoon. It caused organisers to bring the final forward an hour in an effort to beat any inclement weather.
In one hour 47 minutes Carlos Alcaraz managed to get things taken care of as he defeated Lorenzo Musetti 3-6, 6-1, 6-0, winning 12 of the last 13 games for his first Monte Carlo title.
"When you're not winning or the people have really high expectations of you, you don't win tournaments or matches, you know, they probably talk a lot, let's say," Alcaraz said. "So, I just realized that I don't have to think about all they talking about and just focus on myself.
"So, I'm not gonna say I just proved them, that they're wrong, but I just really happy to be able to refocus the important things and just be focused on myself and the part that I have to follow with my team, with my close people, and just playing for myself. So, I'm just really happy that I was able to do it.
"One thing that I learned the last month is I have to think about myself. I have to think about myself. I have to just think about my people, my team, my family, my friends, my close friends. No matter what happen on court, if I win, if I lose, I just have to leave the court happy. I'm proud about everything I have done. So that's something that I learned, and I think I did it this week and it paid off.
"In the next couple of months in this clay season, I will try to just keep going the same way that I approach this tournament and not think about the people talking about expectation. Just I will hear about my close people and my team have things to say to me, and that's all that matter to me. I will try to approach the clay season like this."
It was the first time at the Masters series which pretty much began in 1990 that there was an Italian-Spanish final and for Musetti it was a heart-breaking way to finish the match.
From late in the second he was struggling with an issue to his upper right leg, near the hip flexor. He continued to play on but got progressively worse and the physio and doctor attended to him after the third game of the final set. By that stage it was going to be a hopeless situation for him to come back in the final and Alcaraz did what was necessary to overcome his wounded opponent.
It was the first time Alcaraz had won this title in just his second time playing the event. In fact, this year was the first time he had won a match at the tournament. He is the sixth Spaniard to win and the 18th time a Spanish name is on the trophy in the Open era and in the last 20 years it's the 14th time a Spanish name has Monte Carlo champion beside it. Alcaraz joins Rafa Nadal with eleven (2005-12 and 2016-18), Sergi Bruguera (1991,93) and Juan Carlos Ferrero (Alcaraz's coach 2002-03) with two each and Carlos Moya (1998) and Manuel Orantes (1975) with one each.
Musetti was the third Italian man in the Open era which began in 1968 to reach the final, joining Corrado Barazutti in 1977 and Fabio Fognini who won the title in 2019. Interestingly, the great Nicola Pietrangeli won it in 1968, but the Open era had not started when he won it, it was only three weeks after that the Open era officially started.
"We still don't know yet exactly (what is the injury), but of course we gonna do some exams in the next days," Musetti said. "The thing is that, as you probably saw, I couldn't, you know, finish the match properly, but in a final, I didn't want to retire.
"It was probably the best way to finish, even if I was not able to play anymore. And, yeah, that's it. Probably, you know, the toughness of the long week and the long matches that I played, at the end it cost me a little bit today.
"Physically I was struggling. You know, from the beginning I was trying to compensate a little bit with, you know, with the freedom, you know, to play.
"At the end, as I said before, you know, the physical problems and the fatigue and all the, let's say, stress accumulated in the past days, past matches, you know, they were there. So unfortunately, I couldn't, you know, finish the match. I mean, I couldn't, let's say, fight till the end."
The doubles title has been claimed by Romain Arneodo and Manuel Guinard. The wild cards upset the 7th seeds Julian Cash and Lloyd Glasspool, who had championship point in the second set, 1-6, 7-6, 10-8. History was also made as Arneodo became the first ever Monegasque player to win a doubles or singles title in Monte Carlo, and with that Prince Albert of Monaco could not contain his excitement.
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