{"id":714359,"date":"2026-06-04T11:02:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T11:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/714359\/"},"modified":"2026-06-04T11:02:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T11:02:11","slug":"the-childhood-friends-helping-italian-tennis-soar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/714359\/","title":{"rendered":"The childhood friends helping Italian tennis soar"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In a draw where the seeds were decimated early \u2013 including Sinner, in one of the biggest Grand Slam upsets in recent memory \u2013 10th seed Cobolli weathered the storm to remain in contention.<\/p>\n<p>Eleven months after challenging Novak Djokovic in the Wimbledon quarterfinals, Cobolli has gone a round better, coming from a set and 3-1 down to defeat fourth seed Felix Auger-Aliassime.<\/p>\n<p>Having dropped just two sets throughout the tournament, second-fewest behind Alexander Zverev, the 24-year-old is feeling at home in Paris.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is the best court I\u2019ve ever played on in my life because I can express my best tennis,\u201d he said on court. \u201cI just said to myself to fight because I feel like this is the chance of my life. I have to give everything in my matches.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Rafael Nadal might have retired, but his meticulous legacy lives on at the tournament. Cobolli, who idolises the 14-time Roland Garros champion, is now being recognised for his superstitious tendencies.<\/p>\n<p>The Italian has been eating from the same menu and the same restaurant with his friends after every match, however, one superstition provides a closer connection to Nadal.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI used the same shower as Rafa,\u201d Cobolli said. \u201cI had a memory with that shower that I tried to use the same stall as him and knocked [on the door] and I had to hurry up because he was waiting for me. He told me that it had been his shower for 14 years.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Flavio Cobolli with a nice anecdote about Rafa \ud83c\udf99\ufe0f<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/hashtag\/RolandGarros?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow\">#RolandGarros<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/gGtG0kVjET\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/gGtG0kVjET<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Roland-Garros (@rolandgarros) <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/rolandgarros\/status\/2062287714897011164?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow\">June 3, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>On the contrary, Arnaldi is flying under the radar. Only receiving direct entry into the tournament following Jack Draper\u2019s withdrawal, the 25-year-old is making the most of his opportunity.<\/p>\n<p>Already the first player outside of the top 100 to reach the Roland Garros men\u2019s semifinal since Filip Dewulf in 1997, Arnaldi bids to become the first player in history to make the final in Paris from that position.<\/p>\n<p>His road to the semifinals has not been easy. He has accumulated a total court time of 19 hours and 42 minutes, the longest en route to a Grand Slam semifinal since match times were recorded in 1991.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Despite the length of his matches, Arnaldi is still feeling fresh, eager to be back on court.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m feeling pretty good, actually. Obviously it was a question mark today, because I played two long matches in a row,\u201d said Arnaldi, who overcame an injured Berrettini in the quarterfinals.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In a draw where the seeds were decimated early \u2013 including Sinner, in one of the biggest Grand&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":714360,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":["post-714359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=714359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714359\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/714360"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=714359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=714359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=714359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}