Casper Ruud advances to elusive title match at Italian Open

Norway's Casper Ruud has finally earned a spot in the Italian Open finals.

After getting knocked out in the semis in 2020, 2022 and 2023, the clay court specialist overwhelmed Italy's Luciano Darderi, 6-1, 6-1 in only 65 minutes on Friday in Rome.

But Ruud will have to wait until Saturday to learn his opponent's identity. The second semifinal, between Italy's No. 1 seed Jannik Sinner and seventh-seeded Russian Danill Medvedev, was postponed after heavy rains would not relent.

The match was halted at a dramatic moment, with Sinner leading 6-2, 5-7, 4-2, but Medvedev holding a deuce advantage on his serve. Officials waited 75 minutes until 11:00 p.m. local time before postponing the match. It will resume on Saturday at 3:00 p.m.

There was also a rain delay of an hour and 59 minutes in Ruud's win.

Ruud, seeded 23rd, will vault back up into the Top 20 after Sunday's finals. He will climb to No. 15 with a win or No. 17 with a setback.

Darderi, the 18th seed, was clearly feeling the effects of a grueling, three-hour quarterfinal win over Spain's Rafael Jodar on Wednesday. He did not hold serve in three opportunities in the first set and only won 40% of his first serves in a 27-minute sprint by Ruud.

The second set was more of the same, although the Italian finally held serve on his sixth service game of the match and forced Ruud to play 24 points to win the final two games.

"It feels great," Ruud said. "I am a bit sorry for Luciano, playing at home and not with the most energy, but it is understandable, he finished at 2:30 am the other night. What a tournament he has had and luckily for me, I was done much earlier that day and had a little more time to recover.

"It is my 10th semi-final at a 1000 and his first, so you try to use that experience to your advantage and I think I did well today."

Ruud recorded 20 winners and made 16 unforced errors, compared to nine and 23 by Darderi. He won 29 of 48 points (60%) on his opponent's serve.

Ruud became the sixth active player to reach the finals of all three ATP events played on clay. He competed in the 2024 finals in Monte-Carlo and the 2025 title match in Madrid, where he defeated Great Britain's Jack Draper.

He lost Italian Open semifinals to Serbia's Novak Djokovic (2020, 2022) and Denmark's Holger Rune (2023).

Ruud has never beaten Sinner (0-4) and is 1-3 versus Medvedev.

--Field Level Media