Holger Rune booked the final spot at the 2023 Italian Open in Rome after he defeated fellow Scandinavian Casper Ruud.
The young Dane already played one ATP 1000 final on clay this year. It was only a few weeks ago when he lost to Andrey Rublev in Monte Carlo. In Rome, Rune wanted to play for the trophy again, but Ruud stood in his way after playing his best tournament of the season.
The two had some differences in the past but as the Norwegian disclosed before the match, they have already talked about it and it's a thing of the past. Therefore, both players could focus on their tennis and it was obvious from the first ball.
It took a very long time before fans at Foro Italico had a chance to see a break of serve, and it wasn't in the first set. Both players held onto their service games, even Rune when he was down 0-40 in the sixth game.
Therefore, the first set reached a tie-break and thanks to his incredible level in the first set, Ruud was able to win that comfortably 7-2. The Norwegian hit 22 winners in the first set and he was virtually unstoppable at times.
The second set was quite similar from the former world no. 2, but this time, Ruud got a break and led 4-2. However, Rune refused to give up and fought for every ball. In the following four games, he saved two break points and used two chances that he had to break, resulting in a remarkable comeback to win the second set 6-4 and force a decider.
The third set saw many short games as four of the first seven games were held to love. In the fourth game of the decider, Rune got the crucial break and thanks to his superb serving in this part of the match, he never lost it.
After almost three hours, the young Dane won the match 6-7(2), 6-4, 6-2 after adding one more break to book the 2023 Italian Open final where he will await the winner of the match between the fifth-seeded Daniil Medvedev and the third-seeded Stefanos Tsitsipas.
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