Casper Ruud has had a difficult 2023. The Norwegian was handed a confidence boost when he won his 10th ATP title in Estoril earlier this month, but the 24-year-old has failed to get beyond the third round at the four Masters tournaments he has competed in this year and went out of the Australian Open in the second round. He has exited Madrid after a defeat to Italian qualifier Matteo Arnaldi.
Casper Ruud suffered a shock defeat in the second round of the Madrid Open, falling to a 6-3 6-4 loss to Italian qualifier Matteo Arnaldi.
Arnaldi produced a high-quality performance as he hit 35 winners in a commanding baseline display to condemn the world No. 4 to his ninth defeat of the season.
Arnaldi, who saved a match point to beat Benoit Paire in the first round before beating the Frenchman in three sets, said beating Ruud was the “best match of my life”.
“I don’t know what to say,” Arnaldi, who reached the second round of a Masters tournament for the first time at the Barcelona Open last week, said in his on-court interview.
“In Barcelona, I was playing very good, but coming here it is different.
“The ball bounces so high and I didn’t like it at first. I struggled a bit. But today, I don’t know, maybe the stadium, maybe the pressure on him, but I played the best match of my life.”
Ruud was the first player to drop his serve in the fourth game, but immediately responded in the next game to get back on level terms.
The decisive break in the first set came after a 11-minute game saw Arnaldi move into a 5-3 lead before he closed out the 50-minute set.
Arnaldi broke the Ruud serve in the opening game of the second set and held firm, fighting off a break point in the eighth game with a volley winner at the net, before marching on to victory.
Arnaldi will play Jaume Munar in the next round after Tallon Griekspoor was forced to retire in their match when the Spaniard was leading 7-6(3).
Arnaldi beat Munar last week in Barcelona to secure the first ATP Tour main draw win of his career.
Andrey Rublev is through to the second round after beating Stanislas Wawrinka 7-5 6-4.
Rublev won the contest 7-5 6-4 in one hour and 23 minutes as he chases his second Masters title for the year.
He won his maiden ATP Masters title two weeks ago at the Monte Carlo Masters, beating Holger Rune 5-7 6-2 7-5 in the final.
After recording his 22nd win of the year, Rublev will play world No. 28 Yoshihito Nishioka in the next round.
There was confusion before Rublev’s match with three-time Grand Slam champion Wawrinka when chair umpire Mohamed Lahyani asked if the Swiss player wanted ‘Mutua’ or ‘Madrid’ before the virtual screen showed the result was ‘ATP’.
Lahyani then attempted to restart the coin toss but gave up and told the players “it’s your choice” as he could not set the virtual system up correctly.
Rublev tried to allow Wawrinka to serve and said “you make me stressed” before presenting his fist for a game of rock, paper, scissors, saying: “Okay, let’s do it like this.”
Wawrinka chose scissors which beat Rublev’s paper before the giggling umpire announced: “Stan is serving, thank you.”
