Luciano Darderi Finishes 2025 With Fourth Most Titles

Aside from Carlos Alcaraz (eight titles), Jannik Sinner (four titles), and Alexander Bublik (three titles), Luciano Darderi was the most successful player on the ATP tour in 2025 (alongside Felix Auger-Aliassime) in terms of titles won, having won three throughout the season. In addition, he finished the year at a career high No. 26 in the rankings, making this undoubtedly a fantastic season for the young Italian despite the lack of significant runs at big events.

Darderi Finishes 2025 With Fourth Most Titles

Struggles on hard court and grass

Of Darderi’s 29 wins in 2025, only seven came outside clay; the first came in the Miami first round against another clay specialist, Pedro Martinez, and then he had to wait until Wimbledon to get a couple more before losing to Jordan Thompson in the third round. He then won a match at Winston-Salem and two at the US Open, all three against players ranked outside the top 100. To no one’s surprise, he got routed by eventual champion Carlos Alcaraz in New York.

He won one match in Tokyo and another one in Shanghai, but ended the year with only two top 100 wins outside clay (No. 40 Pedro Martinez in Miami and No. 75 Roman Safiullin at Wimbledon), even if, ironically, his two best career Slam runs took place at Wimbledon and the US Open.

A fantastic season on clay

Darderi’s ranking is almost entirely supported by his clay results, with 1259 out of his 1609 ranking points (78,2%) coming on that surface. That said, his performance in the most significant clay-court events was quite disappointing, especially his first-round loss at Roland Garros to Sebastian Korda. Aside from that, he didn’t play Monte Carlo and lost in the second round of both Rome and Madrid.

At the 500 level, he had some mild success, with quarterfinal runs in Munich and Hamburg, losing to the eventual finalist (Ben Shelton and Andrey Rublev) on both occasions.

It was at the 250 level that Darderi truly shone, winning all three of his 2025 titles. First, he won Marrakech (just a week after making a Challenger final also on clay in Napoli), dropping only one set all week and beating Tallon Griekspoor in two tiebreaks in the final. Then after Wimbledon, he won nine matches in two weeks to pick up titles in Bastad and Umag; while his Umag run was quite soft (with No. 51 Ugo Carabelli being the only top 100 player he faced), his Bastad run was far from straightforward: he had to beat another titan of smaller clay events in Sebastian Baez and also a top 20 player in Francisco Cerundolo to win the title.

What’s Next?

It seems clear at this point that Darderi’s ceiling is going deep and winning some 250 (and 500, although he is yet to win one) events, while maybe one day having a run to the second week at Roland Garros. That should be enough to make him a consistent presence on the ATP tour for a long time, and given how clutch he seems to be in finals (he has won all four he has played in his career so far), he could well finish his career with a very nice title haul. We should definitely expect to see Darderi pick up some more clay titles in 2026.