Canadian Félix Auger-Aliassime falls short to Italy’s Lorenzo Musetti in men’s singles tennis

Until the Paris Olympics, Canada had won just one medal in tennis at the Games, and that was 24 years ago. Félix Auger-Aliassime nearly brought the total to three on Saturday, but he fell short in the bronze-medal singles match to Lorenzo Musetti of Italy at Roland Garros.

Playing 11 matches – singles and doubles – in seven days appeared to have finally taken its toll on Auger-Aliassime and he lost 6-4, 1-6, 6-3.

The Montrealer still leaves Paris with a bronze medal in mixed doubles with Ottawa’s Gabriela Dabrowski. That was the first tennis medal Canada had won since the 2000 Olympics when Sébastien Lareau and Daniel Nestor won gold in doubles.

Auger-Aliassime, 23, also scored victories over top-15 opponents – Casper Ruud and Daniil Medvedev.

He looked sluggish at first on Saturday and he was broken in the opening game after double-faulting. He broke back in the eighth game, but Musetti broke him once more in the ninth and took the opening set 6-4.

The Canadian settled down in the second set and his serve started connecting. He won a break in the first game and went on to win the set 6-1, serving five aces along the way compared with none for Musetti.

The third was more even and both players traded serves until the eighth game when Musetti won a break to go up 5-3. He served out the set for the win.

“Obviously the last break of serve, I think the legs gave up a little bit,” Auger-Aliassime said after the match.

“It was a unique week,” he said with a smile. “But I think the good thing to know is that my body still held up pretty well.”

And he has no regrets about devoting so much time and energy to an event that, unlike stops on the professional tour, had no prize money, and offered no ranking points.

“For me, there’s no hesitation,” he said about playing in the Olympics. There are pro tournaments every week year-round, he added, “but the Olympics is maybe a few times in your life, if you’re lucky. So for me to have done that already in my career, it’s amazing. And why I show up and I try everything I can to play well in these events.”

But the pro tour can’t wait too long. He’s on a flight to Montreal on Monday for the start of the National Bank Open the next day.

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