Record-breaking night in Rome: Ustero and Sanchez reach the final after 4 hours and 12 minutes

Four hours and 12 minutes of pure, unfiltered women’s padel. An epic, endless, almost impossible-to-decipher battle, destined for the history books of the sport. Perhaps this was the only possible way for Ari Sanchez and a magnificent Andrea Ustero to bring an end to the winning streak of Bea Gonzalez and Paula Josemaria, at the conclusion of the longest match in Premier Padel history. They had been unbeaten for two and a half months, winning the five tournaments leading up to the BNL Italy Major, only to be stopped at the most important one of all. Yet in a match like this, which ended 5-7 7-6 7-6, even the losing pair emerged as winners alongside their opponents and the sport itself. Despite the frustration of letting four match points slip away between the second and third sets, they gave everything from the first ball to the last. Quite simply, one pair had to lose, and this time it was them.

The final points tally read 130 to 123, offering a small clue as to where the difference lay in a historic encounter filled with long rallies, momentum swings, brilliant winners and mistakes that might never have happened under less intense circumstances. Yet even those errors helped stretch the contest into history. From around three quarters of the way through the match, the large crowd began greeting almost every point with a roar, fully aware they were witnessing something never seen before. There were countless moments that could have proved decisive, such as the first two match points missed, through little fault of their own, by the eventual losers at 6-5 in the second set, or the third match point erased in the following tie-break by one of the many flashes of brilliance from Ustero, who displayed remarkable composure, maturity and class. All this from a player who is still only 19 years old.

Andrea deserved enormous credit for helping herself and Ari convert their fifth set point after a second set that lasted 95 minutes, forcing the match into a decider. She also played a major role in winning that final set, again in a tie-break, after they had squandered their first two match points, this time with a little more responsibility for the missed opportunities, in the previous game. What followed was yet another emotional rollercoaster. They raced into a 4-1 lead, then lost four consecutive points, before saving a fourth match point at 5-6 thanks to a perfectly timed back-wall retrieval from Ari Sanchez. It became the first point in a run of three that secured victory, smiles, a sprint towards family members in the stands, a place in the history books and, above all, a place in Sunday’s final. There they will face world No. 1s Delfi Brea and Gemma Triay, who will undoubtedly arrive fresher physically, but without the emotional momentum and confidence that only a victory like this can provide.