Grey skies. Persistent drizzle. Damp, heavy tennis balls. After the brilliant sunshine of the previous afternoon, semi-finals day in Monte Carlo must have felt like a parallel universe to Andrey Rublev and Taylor Fritz.
For two players whose forte lies in pounding huge serves and ripping forehands, it was hardly an environment in which to showcase their best tennis, and unsurprisingly the outcome was largely determined by their handling of the conditions. That Rublev came through 5-7, 6-1, 6-3 to reach the third Masters 1000 final of his career – and second in three years in Monte Carloo – was down to the 25-year-old Russian’s belated realisation that, for all the frustration of breaking three times only to drop the opening set, it was a day when serving came with no guarantees.
“The first set was tough, because when you are three times up with a break and you’re losing your serve and then you lose the set, you feel really, really mad,” said Rublev, who will face Holger Rune in Sunday’s final after the Danish sixth seed likewise came from behind to defeat Jannik Sinner 1-6, 7-5, 7-5.
“But then I started to think that the conditions are really tough. Most of the breaks that I lost, Taylor played really aggressive.
“So then I started to think, ‘The conditions are like this.’ I also broke him many times and I had chances, so I just tried to keep playing, to focus on my serve even more. I did this in the second set, and I was able to turn around the situation.
“The third set was the same story. He broke me, and I tried to think that it was the conditions, that I would have chances. I had chances before, I broke him in the second set many times, so I will have at least one chance to break him back. Then I broke him straightaway.”
At that point, after Rublev had broken with a searing backhand down the line to level at 2-2, the light rain that had been falling steadily throughout suddenly became heavier. Rublev raced through his next service game, holding to love with the help of two massive forehands, before the players were forced off court for almost two hours.
As fortune had it, play halted one game before a change of balls was due, meaning Fritz was obliged to play his opening service game with the same wet, heavy balls that had been in use when they stopped. Rublev was the quicker to settle, defying a blustery wind to break as he concluded a 34-shot rally by chasing down a drop shot to land a backhand plum on the baseline. Fritz would win only one more game.
“I don’t think it was ideal for me to come back from the break and be the one serving with the damp clay, you know, heavy balls from when we were playing when it was raining,” said Fritz, who was never able to reproduce the kind of clean, clinical ball-striking that had earned him victory over Stefanos Tsitsipas, the double defending champion, the previous day.
“I think it was very tough to come and play that first game and then go straight into a ball change.”
The second semi-final followed a similar pattern, with Sinner taking the lead only to struggle to get the ball through the court following a rain delay. Unlike Fritz, however, who by his own admission won the opening set partly because the conditions forced him to adopt a safety-first approach, Sinner was at his imperious best early on, overpowering Rune from the baseline and motoring through his service games.
A lull was inevitable at some point, and it came at the start of the second set. He nudged a backhand wide to lose a seesaw service game, Rune held to consolidate the advantage, and Sinner, now trailing 3-0, was never the same after the suspension of play that followed.
“It changed when we went out of the court and with the rain, and after was much slower, for sure,” said Sinner, who fell behind 5-2 on the resumption of play.
“After the rain delay, I had a difficult time.”
The 21-year-old nonetheless fought his way back into contention, levelling the second set at 5-5 after saving two set points, and with Rune beginning to look tight, a straight-sets win began to seem possible. Instead, the confrontational 19-year-old went into Medvedev mode, putting a finger to his lips to silence the baying Italians in the crowd in a manner that, predictably enough, succeeded only in inciting them further.
Rune seemed to thrive on the discord that followed, ignoring the pleas of Carlos Bernardes, the chair umpire, not to get involved, repeatedly putting a finger to his ear as the jeers rained down. His game once again clicked into gear and, before long, he was level. Sinner fought tooth and nail down the stretch, fending off five break points before he was undone by a pair of unforced errors in the final game.
Sinner offered a frosty handshake at the end. No doubt he was still seething after an incident in the eighth game, where Rune, not for the first time, almost struck him after lashing out at a ball that had been called long. Sinner, forced into evasive action, cut an animated figure in the minutes that followed, orchestrating the crowd as he navigated a tricky hold. He declined to discuss his opponent’s antics afterwards.
“I don’t want to comment,” said Sinner, whose reticence spoke volumes.
Rune, who will contest the second Masters 1000 final of his career following his win over Novak Djokovic in Paris last November, was unrepentant.
“My relationship with the crowd was awesome, if you ask me,” said the teenger. “You had so much energy on the court, which is fun. I guess if you ask the crowd, I think they would prefer that than two guys looking down and doing nothing.
“I thought it was a great match. I would probably say not level-wise, but one of the best tennis matches that I have played in my life.”
Rune may have to play another tomorrow: Rublev, who will be desperate to win a first Masters title, survived two match points to defeat him when they last met at the Australian Open in January.