Stefanos Tsitsipas surprisingly lost already in the second round of the 2023 Stuttgart Open, falling to Richard Gasquet.
Only recently, Novak Djokovic said that history is always hovering over him at Grand Slam tournaments, and a few days later, it was Richard Gasquet who had history hovering right over him. He could join the likes of Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, and Andy Murray, to become only 4th active player with 600 ATP-level victories.
The Frenchman had a chance to do that at the 2023 Stuttgart Open, but his opponent wasn't an easy one. In fact, it was the most challenging opponent at the tournament, the first-seeded Stefanos Tsitsipas.
But experienced Gasquet knew that he can beat the Greek, especially, when only a few hours before the match his fellow compatriot Adrian Mannarino stunned Daniil Medvedev, who was the top seed at the 2023 Libema Open.
The two met twice before on the ATP Tour, with each winning one match, so Gasquet had a fair chance to fight for his 600th win, and he did. Early in the match, the Frenchman was down 3-0 in the opening set, but he overcame the deficit to force a first-set tie-break.
Using all of his experience against a Greek, who appeared to be tweeting at the time, Gasquet played a great marathon tie-break, winning it 10-8 to secure the first set against the top-seeded Tsitsipas.
But Tsitsipas wouldn't go down without a fight. The second set was probably the best from the Greek, as he hit 11 winners, while making zero unforced errors. Thanks to that, he was able to win the second set 6-2 and take the match into a decider.
But once again, Gasquet proved to be the more experienced player when it mattered. It seemed that the third set will also go into a tie-break, when the two protagonists of the match played the longest game of it.
After using his fifth match point of the game, Gasquet defeated Tsitsipas 7-6(8), 2-6, 7-5, and also secured the quarterfinal spot at the 2023 Stuttgart Open. But what was the most important for him at the moment, he became only the fourth active player to record 600 wins, joining the likes of Big Four.
"It's a big achievement for me. It's incredible to achieve it. I played 20 years on the Tour and to win 600 matches, it's big for me. I'm very happy with this number. Of course I will try to win some more."
"It's an incredible match. I had a lot of pressure to win the match. He served so well, and of course it's a great victory. Of course I had five match points. It was important for me to win that game. You never know what can happen in a tie-break. I was very happy."
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