Fils defies physical struggles, saves championship point for Tokyo crown

p Never count out a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/arthur-fils/f0f1/overview'Arthur Fils/a at the a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/tokyo/329/overview'Kinoshita Group Japan Open Tennis Championships/a. /p

p The #NextGenATP Frenchman on Tuesday added a dramatic victory against a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/ugo-humbert/hh26/overview'Ugo Humbert/a to his lung-busting campaign at the ATP 500 to clinch the title in Tokyo. Fils saved a championship point in the second-set tie-break before prevailing 5-7, 7-6(6), 6-3 to earn his third tour-level crown. /p

blockquote class="twitter-tweet"p lang="en" dir="ltr"WHAT IT MEANS ????br /br /a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/arthur-fils/f0f1/overview'Arthur Fils/a is your champion in Tokyo ????a href="https://twitter.com/japanopentennis?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@japanopentennis/a | a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/kinoshitajotennis?src=hashamp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"#kinoshitajotennis/a a href="https://t.co/nPfmgRugAo"pic.twitter.com/nPfmgRugAo/a/pmdash; ATP Tour (@atptour) a href="https://twitter.com/atptour/status/1841106943554855105?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"October 1, 2024/a/blockquote script async="" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"/script

p “Honestly I don’t know [how I turned it around],” said Fils, who appeared to struggle with an injury to his left leg for much of the second set. “After 5-all in the first, I was feeling dead on the court. He was playing unbelievable shots. It was a very tight first set. I got a lot of break points and didn’t break. He’s such a great champion and it was very tough. /p

p “I tried my best into the second set and then I saved one match point. Everything in tennis can turn in only one second, and it turned. So I’m very happy, but I could have lost today.” /p

p Fils defeated four Top 20 opponents during his Tokyo run: Top seed a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/taylor-fritz/fb98/overview'Taylor Fritz/a, defending champion a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/ben-shelton/s0s1/overview'Ben Shelton/a, a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/holger-rune/r0dg/overview'Holger Rune/a and Humbert. Three of those four wins came in three sets, while his semi-final triumph against Rune was settled in a pair of hard-fought tie-break sets. It was his second ATP 500 crown following his triumph in Hamburg in July, /p

p “I’m very happy about the tennis I’m producing,” said Fils. “I’m working a lot and trying to build my tennis. I think now it’s better, from Hamburg to here. I still have to improve but it’s cool.” /p

p/p

p Fils’ victory against Humbert was all the more extraordinary considering his physical struggles. He seemed to be physically fading from the championship match when he fell to 3-4, 0/40 on serve in the second set, but the 20-year-old somehow found a way to hold serve and force a tie-break. /p

p Then came one of the highlights of the three-hour, five-minute encounter. Fils fended off the championship point at 5/6 with a stunning backhand pass, the first of three straight points he won to level the match at one-set-all. /p

p “Honestly, I think it’s the best backhand I hit all week,” said Fils of his last-gasp passing shot. “It was crazy. I tried my best and it went perfectly.” /p

p /p

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p Fils, chasing his first Lexus ATP Head2Head victory in four attempts against Humbert, carried that momentum into the decider. He claimed a crucial break in the eighth game before sending an ace down the T to become the second-youngest champion in Tokyo tournament history. /p

p With his movement around the court laboured at times, Fils’ commanding serving display was crucial to his victory. He won 80 per cent (44/55) of points behind his first delivery, according to Infosys ATP Stats, and did not face a break point in the deciding set. /p

p After his latest title triumph, Fils extended his lead in the PIF ATP Live Race To Jeddah. The Frenchman is now 977 points clear of second-placed a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/alex-michelsen/m0qi/overview'Alex Michelsen/a. /p

p [NEWSLETTER FORM] /p