Raphaël Collignon does not know how to give up. Trailing 6-1, 5-3 against Juan Manuel Cerundolo in the Swiss Open Gstaad semifinal, the 24-year-old Belgian staged the most spectacular comeback of the week on the ATP Tour, saving a match point before winning 1-6, 7-6(5), 7-5 to reach the first final of his career at tour level.
The first set looked like a masterclass from the Argentine. Cerundolo controlled the rallies, mixed up his angles, and gave his opponent nothing to work with. In barely thirty minutes, the set was done at 6-1. Early in the second, the script looked the same: Collignon was broken and found himself trailing 5-3, one game from elimination.
That is precisely when everything changed. On a match point in favour of Juan Manuel Cerundolo, the Belgian unleashed a forehand down the line that kissed the chalk. That point changed everything. Raphaël Collignon rattled off games from there, taking the tiebreak 7-5 as the Gstaad Centre Court crowd roared its approval.
The third set confirmed the psychological shift. Cerundolo, visibly shaken by the second-set drama, sprayed more unforced errors. Collignon, meanwhile, finally found his rhythm on Swiss clay, breaking serve at the crucial moment to close it out 7-5.
Ranked 42nd in the world, a career high reached on July 13, the six-foot-three Belgian is having a breakthrough season. His first major scalp came at Roland Garros, where he beat fifth-ranked Ben Shelton in straight sets in the second round. Since then, his trajectory has been nothing but upward.
In Sunday's final, he will face Stefanos Tsitsipas, who dispatched Alexander Shevchenko 7-6(5), 6-3 in the other semifinal. The Greek, a former world No. 3, is finding his best form again on the clay where he has always thrived. The final promises a compelling clash of styles: Tsitsipas's experience against the fearless energy of a Collignon who seems to believe anything is possible.
