![\"Lorenzo](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/musetti-ao-2026-stats.jpg\")
<\/p>\n ATP Tour
\n Two sets up, no way through: Musetti joins rare major retirement list<\/p>\n
View the players who have retired after taking the first two sets<\/p>\n
January 28, 2026<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Getty Images<\/p>\n
Lorenzo Musetti was forced to retire against Novak Djokovic on Wednesday at the Australian Open.
\n By Sam Jacot<\/p>\n
When Lorenzo Musetti<\/a> walked to the net on Tuesday night at the Australian Open<\/a>, the scoreboard told a story that tennis almost never sees.<\/p>\n Two sets to love up against Novak Djokovic<\/a>, the Italian was forced to retire in their quarter-final, joining one of the sport\u2019s most painful and unusual footnotes: players who have led by two sets at a Grand Slam and never finished the match.<\/p>\n You May Also Like: Musetti on injury heartbreak that he \u2018could never imagine\u2019 at Australian Open<\/a><\/p>\n Remarkably, this is not the first time Musetti has found himself on the wrong side of this rare statistic and against the same opponent. At Roland Garros<\/a> in 2021, Musetti stunned the tennis world by taking the opening two sets from Djokovic in the fourth round. Physical struggles followed, Djokovic surged back, and Musetti eventually retired in the fifth set. Five years later, on a different surface, history repeated itself.<\/p>\n Across the entire Open Era (since 1968), there have been only a handful of instances where a player has retired from a major match despite holding a two-set advantage. Grigor Dimitrov<\/a> was the most recent example at last year’s Wimbledon<\/a>, where he retired due to a pectoral injury when leading Jannik Sinner<\/a> 6-3, 7-5, 2-2.<\/p>\n Match (Retired Player Second) Jannik Sinner-Grigor Dimitrov<\/a> Ethan Quinn-Grigor Dimitrov<\/a> Diego Schwartzman-Jack Sock<\/a> Novak Djokovic-Lorenzo Musetti<\/a> Florent Serra-Steve Darcis<\/a>\u00a0 Michael Russell-Sergi Bruguera<\/a> Grover Raz Reid-Sandy Mayer<\/a>\u00a0 Georges Goven-Mike Belkin<\/a> Andres Gimeno-Manuel Santana<\/a> Research contribution from Jon Jeraj<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ATP Tour Two sets up, no way through: Musetti joins rare major retirement list View the players who…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":434927,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[99,428],"class_list":["post-434926","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434926","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=434926"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434926\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/434927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=434926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=434926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=434926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n Score At Retirement
\n Major<\/p>\n
\n 3-6, 5-7, 2-2
\n Wimbledon<\/a> 2025\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n 2-6, 3-6, 6-2
\n Roland Garros<\/a> 2025<\/p>\n
\n 3-6, 5-7, 6-0, 6-1
\n US Open<\/a> 2022<\/p>\n
\n 6-7, 6-7, 6-1, 6-0, 4-0
\n Roland Garros<\/a> 2021<\/p>\n
\n 6-7, 3-6, 5-4\u00a0
\n Australian Open<\/a> 2012<\/p>\n
\n 4-6, 5-7, 6-3
\n Roland Garros<\/a> 2001<\/p>\n
\n 3-6, 5-7, 7-6
\n US Open<\/a> 1974\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n 4-6, 5-7, 3-0
\n Roland Garros<\/a> 1969<\/p>\n
\n 4-6, 2-6, 6-4, 6-4, 1-0
\n Roland Garros<\/a> 1969<\/p>\n