It ended, fittingly, with Alejandro Davidovich Fokina rolling in the red dirt. For once, though, the swashbuckling Spaniard, whose exuberant athleticism will remain the defining image of the past week in Monaco, was not alone.
A few feet away, arms outstretched in triumph as he lay prone on the clay following a 6-3, 7-6 (7-3) victory, was Stefanos Tsitsipas, the Greek third seed, who outwitted and outclassed the 46th-ranked Davidovich Fokina to end his opponent’s fairytale run in the principality and retain his Monte Carlo Masters crown.
The eighth title of Tsitsipas’s career – and first since he triumphed on the clay courts of Lyon last spring – leaves him in elite company. Only Rafael Nadal, Juan Carlos Ferrero, Thomas Muster, Bjorn Borg and Ilie Nastase have previously won back-to-back titles in the principality. It is quite the roll call of former world No 1s, although the glaring difference between Tsitsipas and his feted forerunners is that while they have all won Roland Garros at least once, the Greek is yet to make the breakthrough at grand slam level.
A second Masters 1000 title nonetheless marks an encouraging first step on the road to Paris, where Tsitsipas finished runner-up to Novak Djokovic last summer, and a welcome return to form for the 23-year-old after an indifferent US hard-court swing. It was also a reminder that Tsitsipas, whose lengthy wardrobe changes and frequent coaching violations have been a source of irritation to opponents and onlookers alike, is an exceptional talent whose lofty aspirations remain achievable, even if he has fallen behind the likes of Daniil Medvedev and Alexander Zverev over the past 10 months or so.
“I’m always trying to bring the best I can from clay and adjust accordingly to the other surfaces,” said Tsitsipas, who defeated Zverev in the semi-finals and had also won both his previous encounters with Davidovich Fokina, most recently when the Spaniard extended him to a third set a couple of months ago in Rotterdam.
“I really want to be doing well on hard and grass this year, because I feel like I can really get a lot of points there. If I’m able to win matches with the same consistency I do on this surface, I think I have a big chance of finishing the year of the top two, which is a huge goal of mine to be finally there and belong in that special group of players.”
For Davidovich Fokina, it was perhaps one match too far. The potency of Tsitsipas’s serving, allied with his variety of shot and tactical intelligence, slowly squeezed the life out of the 22-year-old, for whom an early break proved a false dawn as Tsitsipas hit back immediately to level at 2-2 before running away with four of the next five games.
Yet what a week it has been for Davidovich Fokina, whose reward for a run that included wins over world No 1 Novak Djokovic and Taylor Fritz, the 10th seed, will be measured not only in renewed belief that reaching the French Open quarter-finals last year was no fluke, but also in a career-high ranking of 27th. He has won plenty of new admirers, too, with his heart, humility and penchant for flinging himself across the terre batue like a teenage Boris Becker endearing him to the crowd, from whom he received clamorous support.
“For me, this week with my team was amazing, said Davidovich Fokina, who was forced to retire against Tsitsipas with a thigh injury in last year’s quarter-finals. “It was a dream come true to play here in Monte Carlo, [with a] full crowd. You know, to hear the people’s supporting was amazing. I was at the bench thinking, ‘Wow, what a moment.’
“How I manage this week, beating these guys and how much confidence I have now… I will be focused like this week every point, every game. Doesn’t matter who it is, I will enjoy every moment now. It doesn’t matter if I lose or if I win, I’m so happy with what I am doing and I just [want] to keep on that line.”
From a characteristically belligerent fightback by Djokovic to a potentially fatal lapse of focus as he served for a place in the final against Grigor Dimitrov on Saturday afternoon, Davidovch Fokina has survived all manner of setbacks over the past week. Not least among those was his impressive recovery from a set down in the quarter-finals against 10th seed Taylor Fritz, a heartening precedent as he stepped up to serve at the start of the second set. But as Davidovich Fokina sprayed errors off both wings to fall further behind, the momentum was firmly with Tsitsipas who, by the time he completed a swift hold to consolidate the break, had won 20 of the preceding 24 points. It was like watching a Ferrari overtake a bulldozer.
But the Spaniard, the son of a former boxer, is nothing if not a fighter, and when he held in the next game he let out a defiant roar. Davidovich Fokina had spoken before his semi-final of how he used to dream of competing at the tournament as a child, and of how his progress through the draw had made him realise “Wow, I can be there”. Now that newfound sense of belonging began to show. A flying backhand approach set up two break points in the next game, and when a Tsitsipas mishit drew him level, there was another explosion of emotion from the Spaniard.
Now it was game on, Davidovich Fokina launching himself at his groundstrokes, chasing lost causes, producing an astonishing backhand winner at full stretch. Tsitsipas accepted the proffered gauntlet, doubling down from the baseline to bring up two break points in the ninth game only to see Davidovich Fokina cancel out both in crushing style. Unperturbed, the Greek persisted, fashioning a third which he converted with an untameable crosscourt forehand. Tsitsipas would serve for the title.
Still Davidovich Fokina was not done. Tsitsipas had lost his way against Diego Schwartzman from 6-2, 5-2 up and almost lost the match; why not again? A stunning backhand pass gave the challenger a foothold in the game, and he milked the moment for all it was worth, waving his arms wildly to stoke up further frenzy in the stands. The crowd needed little encouragement, and when Davidovich Fokina pounded away an overhead to seal the break, a third set began to look a real possibility. An inevitable coaching code violation did little to improve the outlook for Tsitsipas, but he kept a cool head and played a clinical tiebreak as his opponent’s overexuberance drew him into error.
“He fought in moments that I didn’t really expect him to fight,” said Tsitsipas on court afterwards. “He’s someone that can always hit incredible winners out of nowhere and play extremely unpredictably. But I was able to really minimise that as much as I could today. I knew he could be a dangerous opponent, I’ve played him before.
“I’m proud of myself. I believe that’s a great win. And I’m very sure that we’re going to see good results from him in the future, he’s someone that can really compete against the top guys.”
As Roland Garros hoves into view, Tsitsipas will hope the same proves true of himself in the weeks ahead.