What Lorenzo Musetti Needs to Qualify for the ATP Finals

When Monday started, Lorenzo Musetti was in a pretty difficult spot when it came to his participation at the ATP Finals in Turin. It was a stated goal of the Italian before the season, because what better way to conclude a year than to play on native soil in front of dozens of his fans. As popular as tennis is in Italy, Italian tennis players don’t get too many chances to play back home, so finding a way to Turin would be a dream come true for Musetti.

Unfortunately, due to the heroics by Felix Auger-Aliassime in the previous month, the Italian found himself on the outside looking in. While considered a shoo-in mere weeks ago, the Italian finds himself on Monday, November 3rd, 9th in the ATP Race.

Auger-Aliassime had an almost perfect October, winning the Brussels event as well as making the Paris Masters final, which got him up to 3,845 points. That’s 160 points ahead of Musetti, who had a pretty weak October, failing to hit the needed amount of points to avoid drama.

With only one week remaining to get it done, the Italian found himself in a very tough spot. He had to win Athens and hope that the Canadian didn’t go to far in Metz, since as of Monday morning Felix Auger-Aliassime was still in the draw. Fast forward to now, a couple of hours later, the Canadian withdrew from Metz to give himself time to recover, as playing a lot of tennis in the previous month left his body pretty shaken up.

He understands that qualification is near because it won’t be easy for Musetti to win the needed trophy, as he has only two ATP trophies to his name so far in his career. Couple that with a pretty strong draw–that includes Novak Djokovic and you have an event where Musetti as the winner seems anything but a certainty.

And in the end, if Musetti does win the trophy and jumps over Auger-Aliassime, the Canadian will tip his hat, as he said in his withdrawal statement. Had Auger-Aliassime remained in the draw, he wouldn’t have to worry about Musetti at all because making the semifinal in Metz would have secured him his spot at the event regardless.

This withdrawal increases the chances of Musetti to be there, but only slightly, as he still has to win the trophy. To get there, he’ll likely have to go through Stan Wawrinka, Alexander Muller, Sebastian Korda, and Novak Djokovic. Not an easy lineup to go through, but with the ATP Finals on the line, when if not now.

There is a chance that even if he fails to finish in the Top 8, Musetti still gets a chance to play in Turin because there are rumblings that Novak Djokovic won’t play in the Piedmontese capital. He hasn’t explicitly confirmed nor denied those reports yet, so we’ll see what happens. As of now, to be in Turin, Musetti must lift the Athens trophy.