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Stefanos Tsitsipas is fast gaining traction for being one of the best clay-court players on the tennis circuit.
Earlier on Sunday, Greek star Stefanos Tsitsipas put his name among the greats of the clay court. The 23-year-old beat Alejandro Davidovich-Fokina 6-3, 7-6 (7/3) at the 2022 Monte Carlo Masters final to successfully defend the crown that he won last year.
Tsitsipas is now the only active player on the tennis circuit along with Rafael Nadal to have won back-to-back Monte Carlo titles. And the Greek star only seems to be getting started with his dominance on the clay court.
Only five players have previously been able to defend their Monte Carlo Masters title and Tsitsipas became the sixth player to do so on Sunday. The other five players to have achieved the feat are Rafael Nadal (2005-12, 2016-18), Juan Carlos Ferrero (2002-03), Thomas Muster (1995-96), Bjorn Borg (1979-1980) and Ilie Nastase (1971-1973).
However, Nadal and Tsitsipas are the only two players that are still active on the aforementioned list. The others have retired. This puts Tsitsipas in an elite bracket as Nadal is arguably known as the greatest (clay-court) player of all time.
Tsitsipas beat Andrey Rublev in the Monte Carlo final 12 months ago. His victory on Sunday against Alejandro Davidovich-Fokina earned him back-to-back titles on the clay court. In total, Tsitsipas now has 8 titles on the ATP Tour and four of them have come on clay courts.
It was also a perfect start to the clay-court season for Tsitsipas. The youngster will now be hoping to carry forward his impressive form into the Roland Garros and potentially win his first Grand Slam title.
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