By Scoop Malinowski
From 2013-2019 Pablo Carreno Busta won all seven matches vs Fabio Fognini. Moscow, Paris, Monte Carlo, Sao Paulo, Oeiras, Melbourne, Hamburg…Busta won every time they played.
But then the one-sided rivarly suddenly took a turn in the other direction. Fognini finally beat Busta last year at ATP Cup on hard court 62 16 64.
And yesterday in Rio on red clay, the 34 year old Italian ranked 38 topped Busta again 57 64 63. You don’t normally see a veteran player over the age of 30 suddenly figure out how to beat a younger player who has dominated him in the career head to head.
But Fognini did show signs of making progress and busting some moves on PCB as the last three losses to the 30 year old ranked 18, were all tight duels. 76 in the third most recently in 2019 in Hamburg, 64 in the fourth at 2019 AO, and 76 67 63 in Monte Carlo 2017.
Fognini’s quotes on the ATP site about the win vs Busta in Rio were not at all insightful or revealing though regarding his valuable win vs. such a challenging foe:
“For sure I’m happy because of the feeling that I worked. I’m really happy of course about my victory and my performance, especially because I was fighting until the end. In Rio I have really good memories. This South American swing has always been my favourite place to be, so I’m really happy to be back in the quarter-finals here in Rio.”
Armani Exchange · ATP · Babolat · Fabio Fognini · Pablo Carreno Busta · Rio
