Holger Rune got the best win of his season so far by defeating Taylor Fritz at the Indian Wells Open, despite being match point down.
Rune is seen as one of the biggest talents in tennis, but his results in 2024 before the event in Indian Wells were not at his usual standards. This may have been caused by off-court disruption with his coaching team.
The 20-year-old began the season with Boris Becker and Severin Luthi in his coaching team, but both departed after just a few weeks. This was followed by the Dane electing to work again with Patrick Mouratoglou, which shocked the tennis world.
Rune recently detailed these coaching setup changes and how it has been disruptive. After that chaos, he may feel that the familiarity of working with Mouratoglou once more is what he needs.
Despite these early-season difficulties, Rune played well in his previous matches in Indian Wells, including easing past Lorenzo Musetti. But playing Fritz on home soil was a bigger challenge, and initially, it seemed like the Dane would be comfortably defeated.
Rune badly struggled on return in the opening set. Incredibly, Fritz won over 90% of points on his second serve during the set. This meant the 20-year-old needed to serve impeccably, but he did not do that either in the first set.
Fritz rattled off four games in a row from 2-2 to claim the opening set 6-2. In truth, Rune looked all at sea, and it was difficult to see how he would be able to mount a comeback in California at that stage.
Rune got a crucial hold in his opening service game, where he had to save a break point. This seemed to give him confidence and he created his first break points of the match at 2-2, but Fritz managed to see off that danger.
Some loose shots at 5-4 to Fritz left Rune match point down and staring down the barrel. However, the Dane dug in and managed to triumph in a long game, with a tiebreak eventually being needed to decide the set.
Rune then suddenly burst into life. He began hammering the ball from the baseline, and understandably, Fritz was stunned by the sudden injection of intensity from his opponent. Rune won the tiebreak 7-2 to force a third set.
The decider came down to one game. A combination of errors from Fritz and impressive hitting from Rune gave the two-time French Open quarterfinalist the crucial break he needed in the fourth game.
Fritz never threatened a fightback after that. Rune served out the match comfortably to seal a very impressive 2-6 7-6 6-3 victory that could breathe new life into his season.
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