Berrettini, unfortunately, wasn’t lying: it was all true. The Roman champion’s confirmation leaves fans stunned.
A few weeks ago, a thunderbolt had sowed panic among fans. Few had believed the words of Nicola Pietrangeli and his sudden confession. The legendary tennis player, in talking about Matteo Berrettini, had revealed to Mowmag that something very strange had happened some time before.
“He is a very good guy,” had been the words of the Tunis-born former champion, “but he has a problem in his legs and two years ago he told me he wanted to quit. There has long been debate about this statement and how it was possible that the Roman hammer had dared to even speculate such a thing, net of his achievements and popularity achieved as a top ten player. Wrong, however, were those who believed that Pietrangeli had exaggerated Berrettini’s confession: it was, unfortunately, all true.
The confirmation came with the interview that the Italian player gave, in recent days, to the weekly Donna Moderna. He did not speak specifically about his desire to retire, but in one passage he said something that fits well with Pietrangeli’s statements. It all adds up, then. And Matteo wanted to admit it now because, in the past few days, he broke a real taboo by talking about his depression in Zeta, the original Red Bull series in which he was the first star.
Berrettini
“I have always lived with physical problems,” Berrettini told Donna Moderna, “when I was 10 years old I was diagnosed with a genetic disorder in my back, and already there I had started a rehabilitation path. Since then, my body tends to slow me down, so I’m used to dealing with it. “
Now, comes the crucial passage that perfectly matches that Pietrangeli quote, “In the last 2 years, however, there were times when I didn’t even feel like an athlete anymore, as if my body refused to perform. I even came to question whether I was really meant to play tennis.”
“Deep down I never doubted it. I really asked myself the question, though, because I didn’t understand how those physical troubles could come all at once. The problem is not when the body has breakdowns, but when the head doesn’t support them. For a long time from injuries I came back stronger: I had surgery on my hand and won 2 tournaments after that. Then, at some point, that reservoir of energy ran out. And I found myself in the dark, with the body needing time and the mind denying it. A limbo in which I no longer recognized myself.” Fortunately, from storms, sometimes you come out even stronger than before.