{"id":95311,"date":"2025-05-12T12:30:10","date_gmt":"2025-05-12T12:30:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/95311\/"},"modified":"2025-05-12T12:30:10","modified_gmt":"2025-05-12T12:30:10","slug":"alexander-zverev-claims-theres-been-a-very-strange-change-happen-at-the-italian-open-which-he-cannot-understand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/95311\/","title":{"rendered":"Alexander Zverev claims there’s been a ‘very strange’ change happen at the Italian Open which he cannot understand"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Alexander Zverev has continued his winning run at the Italian Open after securing a spot in the last 16.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In Rome, Zverev had to remind a reporter he won the BMW Open<\/a> last month, which represented his 24th ATP Tour<\/a> title.<\/p>\n

Zverev<\/a> has now stormed into the Italian Open<\/a> round of 16, easing past Camilo Ugo Carabelli and Vilius Gaubas.<\/p>\n

Handed a bye in round one, the German second seed beat the former 6-2, 6-1 in round two and the latter 6-4, 6-0 in round three.<\/p>\n

The world number two now faces 13th seed Arthur Fils, with the Frenchman having just knocked out Stefanos Tsitsipas.<\/p>\n

\"PhotoPhoto by PIERO CRUCIATTI\/AFP via Getty ImagesAlexander Zverev confused by \u2018very strange\u2019 balls at the Italian Open<\/p>\n

But defending champion Zverev hasn\u2019t been entirely pleased with this year\u2019s ATP Masters 1000 event, having been asked after his latest win if he finds the courts faster or slower compared to other years.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe balls are much slower this year,\u201d he said. \u201cI don\u2019t know what they did with the balls again. Obviously we\u2019re playing with the Dunlop balls throughout the whole clay court season. In Monte-Carlo and Munich and Madrid, we played with extremely fast balls.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Tracy Austin and Jim Courier disagree over who is more likely to win a Grand Slam out of Alexander Zverev, Jakub Mensik and Joao Fonseca<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWe played with a fast ball. The ball was very, very big as well. I arrived here\u2026 I mean, it\u2019s possibly the same ball, but it\u2019s not the same ball. There\u2019s no chance.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m stringing my racket about three kilos less than anywhere else during the clay court season. That\u2019s what makes it slower. That\u2019s what makes the big difference compared to last year, I think is the ball. Very strange.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know what to say because the same company. They try to tell us it\u2019s the same ball, but there\u2019s no chance in the world that it is.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Alexander Zverev says how important the French Open is for him<\/p>\n

The Italian Open continues the clay court season, and notably builds up towards the French Open in Paris.<\/p>\n

The next Grand Slam of 2025 gets underway later this month, with Zverev having lost the most recent final.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Alexander Zverev calls for rule change after controversy in his Madrid Open win over Alejandro Davidovich Fokina<\/a><\/p>\n

He was beaten by Jannik Sinner in the Australian Open final in January, and indeed lost last year\u2019s French Open final to Carlos Alcaraz.<\/p>\n

Those defeats came after he fell to Dominic Thiem in the 2020 US Open final, meaning Zverev has lost all three of his career Grand Slam finals.<\/p>\n

\"PhotoPhoto by Andy Cheung\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

He is, however, feeling upbeat ahead of the French Open, having been asked if he feels like his goals are up again as he eyes the top prize at Roland Garros.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, I mean, Roland Garros is my main goal, that\u2019s for sure,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve said that last year. I think the Grand Slams are my main targets.<\/p>\n\nResult<\/strong><\/td>\nYear<\/strong><\/td>\nTournament<\/strong><\/td>\nSurface<\/strong><\/td>\nOpponent<\/strong><\/td>\nScore<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\nLoss<\/td>\n2020<\/td>\nUS Open<\/td>\nHard<\/td>\nDominic Thiem<\/td>\n6\u20132, 6\u20134, 4\u20136, 3\u20136, 6\u20137(6\u20138)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\nLoss<\/td>\n2024<\/td>\nFrench Open<\/td>\nClay<\/td>\nCarlos Alcaraz<\/td>\n3\u20136, 6\u20132, 7\u20135, 1\u20136, 2\u20136<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n\nLoss<\/td>\n2025<\/td>\nAustralian Open<\/td>\nHard<\/td>\nJannik Sinner<\/td>\n3\u20136, 6\u20137(4\u20137), 3\u20136<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

Alexander Zverev Grand Slam final record<\/p>\n

\u201cIn Australia I was in the finals. Of course it was very bitter, just sad for me to lose the way I lost in Australia. But luckily we have four chances a year.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor me Roland Garros is always kind of the one I\u2019m looking forward to the most. I hope I can play good tennis there, yeah, just show my strengths.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alexander Zverev has continued his winning run at the Italian Open after securing a spot in the last…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":95312,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4105],"tags":[4721,4294,25564,79,1068,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-95311","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-alexander-zverev","9":"tag-atp","10":"tag-italian-open","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-tennis","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114494873844775405","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95311","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=95311"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95311\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/95312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}