Alexander Zverev beat the world No. 1 and No. 2 in consecutive matches to win the year-end ATP Finals singles championship for a second time.
After eliminating No. 1 Novak Djokovic in three sets in the semifinals, Zverev needed just one hour and 15 minutes to beat No. 2 Daniil Medvedev 6-4, 6-4 in the championship match played for the first time in Turin, Italy.
The title culminates quite a year for Zverev, who also won the gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics and finished 2021 with more wins on tour — 59, one more than Medvedev — than anyone else. Zverev ended the year ranked No. 3 in the world, and with a tour-leading six titles.
“There’s no better way to end the season than winning here,” Zverev said. “I’m also now very much looking forward to next year already.”
Medvedev, the U.S. Open champion who won this event last year when played in London, had beaten Zverev five consecutive times.
The main thing missing in Zverev’s resume is a major singles title, having lost to Dominic Thiem in the epic 2020 US Open final that ended in a fifth-set tiebreaker.
The final in Turin was a rematch of a round-robin encounter Tuesday, when Medvedev beat Zverev in a third-set tiebreaker.
This one went Zverev’s way from the start, as the 6-foot-6 player crushed a huge backhand to the corner then gained from a net-cord winner to break Medvedev’s serve in the third game of the match.
Helped by fast conditions, Zverev was virtually untouchable on his serve, winning 20 of 25 points in the first set.
Zverev broke again in the opening game of the second set and then grew so confident that he began executing audacious swinging-volley winners as he followed his serve to the net on occasion.
This marked the first edition of the season-ending event for the top eight players in Turin after 12 years in London, where Zverev won his first finals title in 2018.
