Former World No. 99 Pedro Sousa put a bow on his professional career Thursday at the Del Monte Lisboa Belém Open in Portugal.

The host site of the ATP Challenger Tour 75 event, the Club Internacional de Foot-Ball is Sousa’s home club, making the 35-year-old’s final tournament a memorable goodbye.

“The hardest part is long gone, it was when I had to make the decision. It seemed like this day would never come, but suddenly it was here,” Sousa said in Portuguese at a press conference in Lisbon. “Before the match I was okay, but then that pressure came. Playing here is always special. I had friends, family and club members that I see daily, which gave me extra strength to perform well.”

Sousa, who turned pro in 2007, collected eight ATP Challenger Tour titles and is one of four Portuguese men to crack the Top 100 of the Pepperstone ATP Rankings in the past decade.

After earning his 201st career Challenger-match victory this week in Lisbon, where his father ‘Manecas’ works as the tournament director, Sousa clashed against countryman and former World No. 28 Joao Sousa, who reached the highest ranking in Portuguese tennis history in 2016.

In front of a full crowd, Pedro soaked in the final moments of his career.

“I feel relief, finally,” Sousa said, while cracking a laugh. “It is what it is. I was more or less prepared. I also had some time to prepare. It was special because it happened in my club like I wanted, during a national holiday in front of a full stadium against the best Portuguese player ever.”

Joao Sousa (left) embraces Pedro Sousa, who was playing his final match Thursday in Lisbon.” />
^{Joao Sousa (left) embraces Pedro Sousa, who was playing his final match Thursday in Lisbon. Credit: FPT/Sara Falcao}
Sousa’s most memorable moment from his career was representing his home country in the 2021 Tokyo Olympic Games. The year prior, the Lisbon native enjoyed a surprise runner-up finish as a lucky loser at the ATP 250 event in Buenos Aires. All eight of his Challenger titles came on clay courts, with two triumphs on home soil. When Sousa reflected on his career, one match stuck out.

“The best match ever has to be the final against [Jan-Lennard] Struff in the [2018] Pullach [Germany] Challenger,” Sousa said. “Winning 6-3, 6-1 in the final of a Challenger 125 was even better than when I beat him the year before [in Davis Cup], because in that one I had to suffer a bit in the end.

“I’m happy and proud of my career and have no regrets. Most people don’t know the struggles we go through, it’s a very tough career. I’ve made some mistakes of course, but I’m happy with my achievements.”

Unseeded Austrians Alexander Erler and Lucas Miedler defeated French singles stars Ugo Humbert and Adrian Mannarino 6-2, 6-2 to make a winning start to their Rolex Shanghai Masters campaign on Friday.

Erler/Miedler were a perfect six-for-six on break chances in the 57-minute match, while saving two of the four break points against them. The Austrians won more than 50 per cent of their return points against both first and second serve.

Erler/Miedler are in 15th place in the Pepperstone ATP Live Doubles Teams Rankings but could make up significant ground on the top eight with a deep run in Shanghai.

Fifth-seeded Argentines Maximo Gonzalez and Andres Molteni — comfortably inside the top eight at fourth place in their quest to qualify for the Nitto ATP Finals in Turin — also notched an opening win on Friday with a 6-4,  6-4 result against Hugo Nys and Jan Zielinski.

Seventh seeds Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos scored a 7-6(5), 7-6(3) win against Belgians Sander Gille and Joran Vliegen, with both teams breaking twice in the match. The victorious Spanish-Argentine duo is in sixth place in the Pepperstone ATP Live Doubles Teams Rankings.

Rounding out Friday’s doubles action in Shanghai, wild cards Gonzalo Escobar and Aleksandr Nedovyesov beat Lloyd Glasspool and Harri Heliovaara 6-4, 6-4.

The Rolex Shanghai Masters celebrated 25 years of professional tennis in the Chinese city on Friday.

The Shanghai event has operated as an ATP Masters 1000 since 2009, and was awarded ATP Masters 1000 Tournament of the Year, as voted by players, in each of its first five years with that status. The Nitto ATP Finals, then known as the Tennis Masters Cup, was also held in Shanghai in 2002 and from 2005-08.

The lone Masters 1000 in Asia, Shanghai regularly attracts the biggest names on the ATP Tour, with stars like Roger Federer, Andy Murray and Novak Djokovic all former champions at the state-of-the-art Qi Zhong Tennis Center.

Special guests at Friday’s ceremony included ATP Chairman Andrea Gaudenzi; Charles Humphrey Smith, an ATP Tournament Advisory Council member and the Rolex Shanghai Masters managing director; and Rolex Shanghai Masters tournament director Michael Luevano.

Mr. Wang Ping, Deputy Secretary of Municipal People’s Government, accepted a special crystal trophy to mark the 25-year celebration. 

“China is a very big market and tennis is a global sport,” Gaudenzi said during the ceremony. “Our presence here in China is really important for us because we want tennis to become a popular sport in the entire world.”

The growth of tennis in Shanghai has coincided with the rise of Chinese stars at the professional level. In addition to two-time Grand Slam champion Li Na on the women’s side, young stars like Wu Yibing, Zhang Zhizhen and Shang Juncheng are emerging now on the ATP Tour.

Zhang Zhizhen added another historic achievement to his groundbreaking year on the ATP Tour on Friday at the Rolex Shanghai Masters.

The World No. 60 defeated Tomas Martin Etcheverry 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 to become the first home favourite to reach the third round in the history of the ATP Masters 1000 event. Zhang edged the 28th-seeded Argentine in a gripping two-hour, 28-minute encounter played out amid a raucous atmosphere inside the Qizhong Forest Sports City Arena.

“First set I was down, and he had a break,” said Zhang after the match. “I told myself, second set I still have a chance. I just tried to hold my service games and see if I could break him. First set my return was not working well, so I changed my position a bit and I’m happy to win the match of course.”

History made 👏 👏

From a set down Zhang defeats Etcheverry to become the first Chinese man to reach the third round at the Shanghai Masters!@SH_RolexMasters | #RolexShanghaiMasters pic.twitter.com/hPQ4jP624W

— ATP Tour (@atptour) October 6, 2023

Zhang clinched a crucial break in the ninth game of the deciding set and then held his nerve to convert his third match point in a final game featuring a series of bruising baseline exchanges. He outhit Etcheverry by 32 winners to 30 to seal his eighth Top 50 win of the season.

Zhang became the first ATP Masters 1000 quarter-finalist from China in May in Madrid and in July rose to No. 52 in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings, the highest position ever held by anyone from the East Asian country. He beat Casper Ruud at the US Open to become the first Chinese man to beat a Top 5 opponent and is now the first player from his country to win back-to-back matches in 12 editions of the Shanghai event.

“It’s a first-time experience for me,” said Zhang, a hugely popular figure in his homeland. “Everything is new. I just try to take it, these are not bad things [that are happening]. So why not just take it [as it goes] and enjoy it?”

Zhang will take on American Brandon Nakashima on Sunday as he bids to reach the last 16 of a Masters 1000 tournament for the second time.

Buyunchaokete’s first-round win against Miomir Kecmanovic had ensured there were two Chinese players in the Shanghai second round for the first time. That is where the 21-year-old’s run ended, however, as Sebastian Korda prevailed 6-1, 6-4 to immediately back up his run to the Astana title match. The 26th seed will next take on defending champion Daniil Medvedev or Cristian Garin.

Roman Safiullin lit up the Shanghai night, crushing 32 winners, to upset ninth seed Alexander Zverev 6-3, 6-1. Safiullin took the ball early and often worked his way forward, winning 18 of 22 net points to avenge last month’s Chengdu final loss to the German.

Following the 26-year-old’s second career Top 10 victory, Safiullin is up eight spots to No. 42 in the Pepperstone ATP Live Rankings. Safiullin, who ousted Andy Murray in the Shanghai first round, will next meet 19th seed Ben Shelton.

Marton Fucsovics held firm to upset Felix Auger-Aliassime win a hard-hitting contest on Show Court 3. The Hungarian completed a 7-6(3), 4-6, 6-3 triumph to reach the third round for the first time on his second main-draw appearance in Shanghai, where he will next face Francisco Cerundolo. The Argentine held his nerve for a 7-6(4), 7-6(5) triumph against Mackenzie McDonald.

The American Shelton and Sebastian Baez also made winning starts to their Shanghai campaigns. Shelton downed Jaume Munar 6-4, 6-4 while Baez ended Australian qualifier Dane Sweeny’s run with a 6-2, 6-4 win that booked the Argentine a clash with Beijing champion Jannik Sinner or Marcos Giron.

Is anyone arriving at the Rolex Shanghai Masters in better form than Jannik Sinner?

The Italian arrives at the ATP Masters 1000 fresh from notching back-to-back victories against Carlos Alcaraz and Daniil Medvedev to claim his third title of the season in Beijing. Beating the top two seeds in the Shanghai draw so recently has left the Italian’s confidence sky-high, particularly his maiden Lexus ATP Head2Head triumph, at the seventh attempt, against Medvedev.

“I’m always looking for the very tough challenges and I’m very happy that I had the chance to play against him again,” said Sinner on Friday of his Medvedev win. “Obviously finals are a little bit different, but for me it is always a huge pleasure when I get the chance to play against the best players in the world.

“I lost many times against him. I changed a couple of things, tactical things, which were working very well at some points, but this is all part of the process and the practice sessions we have done. We try to analyse a couple of things after the match and make the same things happen in practice. This is part of the work we are putting in and you have to show this in a match.”

In contrast to his rivalry with Medvedev, Sinner now leads Alcaraz 4-3 in the pair’s Lexus ATP Head2Head series. He is one of the few players on Tour who has regularly caused problems to the Spaniard during his meteoric rise.

“Every time when I play against him, I feel like we both try and push ourselves to the limit,” said Sinner. “Both of us obviously hate losing, especially against each other. We have a very good relationship off court. I feel like we are good friends, but still on court you feel a little bit nervous because you want to win. You hate losing.

“We both are very young, and we also feel like when we play, many people are watching. It’s a mix of everything and it’s obviously a huge pleasure to share the court with him. In this way, I always try to look forward to these matches. I feel when I play against the best players in the world I can really see where to improve, and that is basically my main goal.”

Sinner will hope his focused approach continues to pay off on Saturday when he meets Marcos Giron on his Shanghai debut. Despite his recent successes, which also include lifting his maiden Masters 1000 crown in August in Toronto, the Italian reiterated his commitment to improving in every way he can.

“It’s not about when you win one big title that things are going to change dramatically, especially the mindset,” said Sinner. “I felt at the US Open I should have done a couple of things better. I practised a lot with my team, especially on the mental side and trying to understand my brain a little bit better. I recognised that I made a couple of mistakes and I tried to improve. I feel like the things I showed in Beijing last week were an improvement.”

As well as vying to eclipse his rivals for Masters 1000 glory, one of Sinner’s goals in Shanghai will be to boost his chances of joining Alcaraz, Medvedev and Novak Djokovic in booking a berth at the Nitto ATP Finals. The 22-year-old is in fourth in the Pepperstone ATP Live Race To Turin as he attempts to qualify directly for the prestigious season finale for the first time.

It may have been a long four years since the previous edition of the Rolex Shanghai Masters, but Daniil Medvedev retains strong memories of his successful 2019 campaign in China.

Medvedev overcame Alexander Zverev in the championship match that year to cap a stellar run on hard courts during which he lifted his first two ATP Masters 1000 crowns (Cincinnati, Shanghai) and reached his maiden Grand Slam final at the US Open. The 27-year-old believes his Shanghai triumph was crucial in proving his spurt of success was no flash in the pan.

“This title is really strong in my memory,” said Medvedev on Friday as he prepares to defend his 2019 crown in Shanghai. “I managed to go on a run of reaching six finals in a row. Three of them were Masters 1000s and one was a Grand Slam. At the time it was huge for me. I probably didn’t expect and didn’t think I would be able to do something like this.

“[Shanghai] was the tournament, after this great US summer, where everyone was asking, and I was asking myself: ‘Am I really capable of going again and playing good and winning the title maybe?’ I managed to do it. I loved the tournament and loved the city, so it really gave me a lot of confidence for the future also.”

Medvedev has notched a Tour-leading 42 wins on hard courts in 2023 and has lifted four of his five ATP Tour crowns this season on the surface. Despite defeat to Jannik Sinner in Wednesday’s final at the China Open in Beijing, he is delighted with the consistency of his displays on his favoured surface.

“Probably only the Australian Open, Toronto and Cincinnati were not the best [for me this year],” said Medvedev. “At the same time, that’s how the Tour is. I lost against strong players in tough battles. Other than that, probably all other tournaments on hard courts I played great. Hopefully I can finish [the year] on the same note.”

Having already qualified for the Nitto ATP Finals for the fifth consecutive year, Medvedev is feeling relaxed as the Tour enters a part of the season in which he has historically performed well. Medvedev has won six of his 20 tour-level crowns at post-US Open events on the ATP Tour calendar, and is happy with how his body is holding up having played 72 matches so far in 2023.

“It’s never easy, but at the same time sometimes the better you play, the more confidence you have and the more you can still go for it more and more,” said Medvedev, who will hope to improve his 59-13 record when he takes on Cristian Garin in his Shanghai opener. “Right now I’m feeling good, I’m playing good and enjoying being back in China. I’m happy to try to continue this way here in Shanghai.”

Casper Ruud’s long wait for his Rolex Shanghai Masters debut did not disappoint.

The eighth seed powered to a 7-5, 6-0 triumph against Yoshihito Nishioka on Friday at the Chinese ATP Masters 1000 event. The Norwegian let slip an early 4-1 lead on the Qizhong Tennis Center’s Stadium Court but quashed Nishioka’s comeback in style by winning eight straight games from 5-5 for a 75-minute second-round win.

“I’m very happy of course,” said Ruud. “Yoshihito came back in a tough, long first set. These things can happen. Whoever wins a first set like this will feel motivated to keep going in the second.

“I know the feeling myself. You feel like you worked hard for an hour just to lose the set and it feels like you have to climb a mountain to turn the match around. Maybe that’s what happened. I got a great start in the second and I just kept it going.”

A Shanghai debut to remember 🌟@CasperRuud98 flies into the third round, defeating Yoshihito Nishioka 7-5, 6-0.#RolexShanghaiMasters | @SH_RolexMasters pic.twitter.com/bmA7aoHBWE

— ATP Tour (@atptour) October 6, 2023

Ruud is attempting to complete the set of fourth-round appearances at all nine ATP Masters 1000 events as the ATP Tour returns to Shanghai for the first time since 2019. A deep run will also boost the Norwegian’s Nitto ATP Finals qualification hopes. The 24-year-old, a finalist at the prestigious season finale last year, is currently 10th in the Pepperstone ATP Live Race To Turin.

His next opponent in Shanghai will be Christopher Eubanks. The 29th-seeded American was in early trouble on Friday, but he rallied to a 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 triumph against Yannick Hanfmann.

Another Turin hopeful, Holger Rune, could not join Ruud in the third round. Brandon Nakashima powered to a 6-0, 6-2 triumph against Denmark’s Rune, converting five of his 14 break points in a scintillating display.

It was a maiden Top 10 victory for Nakashima, who has struggled to find his best level this year after lifting the trophy at the 2022 Next Gen ATP Finals. It was just the third time this season he has sealed consecutive tour-level wins, and the American will hope to make it three in a row in Shanghai when he next faces Tomas Martin Etcheverry or home favourite Zhang Zhizhen.

Rune’s defeat is a blow for 20-year-old as he looks to qualify for the Nitto ATP Finals for the first time. He remains eighth in the Pepperstone ATP Live Race To Turin but has now won just one of seven matches since reaching the quarter-finals at Wimbledon in July.

Three other seeded players joined Rune in exiting the Shanghai draw after early defeats on Friday. Fabian Marozsan, the 23-year-old Hungarian who upset Carlos Alcaraz in May in Rome, downed 11th seed Alex de Minaur 6-3, 7-5. The World No. 91 outhit De Minaur by 28 winners to 15 for an 85-minute triumph.

Marozsan, who claimed his first hard-court Masters 1000 win in the first round against Arthur Rinderknech, will take on Dusan Lajovic next. The Serbian led 6-4, 3-2 when his 23rd-seeded opponent Tallon Griekspoor retired from their second-round clash.

Lorenzo Musetti also fell to a second-round defeat. Hsu Yu Hsiou, the qualifier from Chinese Taipei, eased to a 6-3, 6-4 victory against the 11th seed to book a third-round clash with Hubert Hurkacz, who beat Thanasi Kokkinakis 7-6(5), 6-4. Hsu had not competed at a Masters 1000 event prior to this week in Shanghai.

A native of Buenos Aires, Camilo Ugo Carabelli grew up doing what many young Argentine boys enjoy: playing football. At age seven, Ugo Carabelli would finish football practice and then ride alongside his mother to pick up his brother, Jeremias, from the tennis courts.

When Jeremias invited Camilo to try tennis, they both were met with surprise.

“My brother said, ‘Come hit with me,’” Camilo recalled to ATPTour.com. “The first time I hit the ball, it was perfect and he said, ‘Whoa, I think you can play tennis better than football,’ because me and football are very bad.”

Despite being a natural from the start, it was not until a decade later, when Ugo Carabelli was 17, that he had pro tennis aspirations. The Argentine wanted to enjoy being with family and friends while also focussing on school as a teenager. Those values still live with Ugo Carabelli, who is taking classes at the University of Palermo and has each of his family member’s names [Gustavo Ugo, Maria Marta and Jeremias] and their dates of birth tattooed on his body.

“I really like tattoos. I got my first tattoo, my mom’s name, when I was 15,” said Ugo Carabelli, who has 20 tattoos. “I think I will finish my arm tattoo and then start on my leg, but not for two years I think.”

Camilo Ugo Carabelli wins the Challenger 100 event in Antofagasta, Chile.” />
^{Camilo Ugo Carabelli at the Antofagasta Challenger. Credit: Challenger Dove Men+Care Antofagasta}
Ugo Carabelli’s latest mark came on the ATP Challenger Tour two weeks ago, when he triumphed at the Challenger Dove Men+Care Antofagasta in Chile, claiming his fourth title at that level and first since August 2022. Returning to the winners’ circle was a welcome sight for Ugo Carabelli, who dealt with a hip injury earlier this season.

“It was very important because this year I’ve had many injuries, first in my hip,” he said. “After Roland Garros, I did not play for two or three months. I haven’t played too much this year, so winning a Challenger is very special for me.”

Now coached by former World No. 37 Carlos Berlocq, Ugo Carabelli and his team did not know the root cause of the hip injury that kept him away from competition, only growing the frustration for the 24-year-old, who cracked the Top 100 of the Pepperstone ATP Rankings last August.

“One day, I’m good. Then I would wake up another day and I’m very bad, I can’t walk, I can’t hit the ball,” he said. “Me and my team, we didn’t understand anything like, ‘Where is the problem?’”

Since returning to action, Ugo Carabelli has made two Challenger finals, including his title run in Antofagasta, and is now aiming for another deep run at this week’s Campeonato Internacional de Tênis in Brazil, where he is seeded eighth.

Camilo Ugo Carabelli wins the 2023 Challenger Dove Men+Care Antofagasta.” />
^{Credit: Challenger Dove Men+Care Antofagasta}

One of the latest INSIGHTS metrics, Serve Effectiveness takes a holistic look at player serves by simply measuring how often the shot earns a player an advantage in points.

Expressed as a percentage, the metric includes aces, service winners, unreturned serves and points in which a player is In Attack on the first ball after the serve.

By combining all of these statistics into one measure, we can achieve a fuller understanding of a player’s serving prowess — stripping away unrelated factors like performance in ensuing rallies, which is implicitly factored into basic statistics like service points won.

Like all INSIGHTS, a player’s Serve Effectiveness data can be compared to his season average and the ATP Tour average to better understand how much of a relative strength (or weakness) his serve is.

Out of the initial 32 seeds for this year’s Wimbledon (prior to withdrawals), three players broke the 70 per cent mark by this metric on first serve over the previous 52 weeks: Nick Kyrgios, Hubert Hurkacz and Felix Auger-Aliassime.

#ServeEffectiveness shows the % of points where the serve creates an advantage for the player pic.twitter.com/Ql16De4GqN

— Tennis Insights (@tennis_insights) July 2, 2023

Ben Shelton is also among the leaders with a 67.5 Serve Effectiveness rate on first serve and a 33.3 % rate on second serve, based on statistics compiled during his US Open semi-final run.

The ATP Tour average Serve Effectiveness rate on first serve is 58 per cent, broken down as follows: aces (16%), unreturned (22%), attacking first ball (20%). That leaves 38 per cent for a neutral rally state on the server’s first ball, three per cent for defence on the first ball, and one per cent for return winners. The average Serve Effectiveness on second serve is 23 per cent.

Looking forward to seeing how this🚀 will develop over the next few years & seeing what level the #ServeEffectiveness can reach📈@BenShelton is already well above the Tour Avg. for both 1st & 2nd serve. His highest single match 1st #ServeEffectiveness performance this year has… pic.twitter.com/0r1B5TOOwM

— Tennis Insights (@tennis_insights) September 7, 2023