Taylor Fritz has a love affair with Indian Wells: there he debuted in an ATP preview in 2015, in the main draw of a Masters 1,000 in 2016beat a top-10 for the first time, Cilic (7th), in 2017, achieved his biggest victory, against Zverev (4th), in 2021, the year in which he played his first semifinals in a tournament in the category. And there he will play his first final on Sunday (23:00, #Vamos) after beating a rival of his generation (1997), only eight days older than him, Andrey Rublev, in two sets (7-5 and 6-4).
Fritz, Californian by birth, he is the first American finalist in the tournament since Isner in 2012 and he wants to be the first champion since Agassi in 2001. And that Jaume Munar had him on court for almost three hours in the third round and only gave up in the third set tiebreak. His rival will be Spanish, Alcaraz or Nadal who faced each other last night.
Fritz and Rublev met before doing so this Saturday on four occasions on the ATP circuit (3-2 for the American after this victory) and another four in juniors (3-1 in favor of the Russian). They had already seen each other at BNP Paribas and Fritz won. This time his intimate enemy, who had accumulated 13 wins in a row with titles in Marseille and Doha, he was in tow, moody to the point that he self-injured his knee and right hand on the racket strings. As well the presence of a fan with a yellow cap had irritated himsupporter of Fritz, very close to the places occupied by the members of his team, with the Spanish Fernando Vicente, his coach, among them. Much character. In the end, he took the defeat with sportsmanship.
Indian Wells Masters 1,000 results.