In a fitting end to a memorable week of tennis, Stefanos Tsitsipas edged out Dominic Thiem 6-7 (6), 6-2, 7-6 (4) to win the Nitto ATP Finals at the O2 Arena. The Greek takes home his fourth and biggest title to date.
Both men were making their first appearance in the championship match of the year-end showpiece and provided the fans in London with a thrilling climax to the tennis season as the final seesawed back and forth before the Greek eventually came out on top.
“I have no clue how I played so well in the second set," said Tsitsipas. "I have no idea. I think my mind was at ease and I wasn’t really thinking of much, which led to such a great performance in the second set, breaking him twice,” said Tsitsipas. “I didn’t give him much options to play with in the second set. It was pretty much an excellent set for me.
This is the fourth straight year that a first-time season finale titlist has been crowned, following in the footsteps of Andy Murray (2016), Grigor Dimitrov (2017) and Alexander Zverev (2018).
It was the fourth time in 50 editions of the Nitto ATP Finals that a title match was decided on a final-set tie-break (also 1988, 1995 and 2005).