It was clear from before he even muttered a word at his post-match press conference that Alex de Minaur should not have been in the line of fire of media questions so soon after one of his most painful defeats.
After coming so close to what would have been a first victory at the ATP Finals, De Minaur was forced to contemplate another narrow loss against a top 10 opponent in a year that has been littered by a succession of stories of what might have been.
In so many ways, De Minaur is one of the great achievers in tennis, with this gutsy performer lifting his game in recent years to a level that has secured his position in the upper echelons of the sport over the last few years, but he appears to have hit a ceiling in his levels when it comes to matches against the very best in men’s tennis.
De Minaur looked set to seal victory as he held the upper hand in the deciding set of his match against Lorenzo Musetti on Tuesday night, but he failed to hold serve when he had the match at his mercy at 5-4 and ended up slipping to another desperate loss.
Outside of the Laver Cup, De Minaur has now suffered 16 consecutive losses against players inside the top 10.
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During that miserable run, he has lost to Alexander Zverev, Jannik Sinner, Daniil Medvedev, Carlos Alcaraz, Taylor Fritz, Ben Shelton, Novak Djokovic, Andrey Rublev and Lorenzo Musetti, with this defeat clearly hitting him hard.
“If I really want to be serious about taking the next step in my career, these matches, I can’t lose them. I just can’t,” he said.
“I mean, it feels like I’ve lost a lot of them this year. More than anything, it’s getting to a point where mentally it’s killing me.
“I just (need to) win these matches. It’s something that if it doesn’t get sorted, it’s going to eat me alive.
“I need to get it sorted sooner rather than later. I don’t know how many times I can deal with a loss like this one.”
It wasn’t just the words offered up by De Minaur in his press conference that summed up his mood, with the despair in his face evident as he looked a little like a boxer who had just suffered a knock-out blow.
The rules at major tennis tournaments compel players to speak to the media if a request is submitted and at an event as big as the ATP Finals, that will mean offering up opinions after victories and defeats.
Tennis is one of the few sports that compels beaten players to face the media straight after their setback, with Naomi Osaka among those who have suggested in recent years that the rules over the requirements to speak to the media could be looked at.
Golf is a sport that has different rules for media engagements as players are not required to speak to the media, with Masters champion Rory McIlroy among those who has opted to skip his press conference duties at times in recent years.
De Minaur’s agony in Turin may well spark a debate over whether players who have just suffered the agony of a defeat need to put themselves through more pain by speaking about their loss so soon after.
While meeting the requirements of the media who make the effort to attend the tournament in person and promoting the sport of tennis always has to be factored into the decision over whether a player completes a press conference, this looked like a moment when a statement issued to the media rather than a painful appearance in front of the cameras would have been more suitable.
De Minaur was a little incoherent at times as he was struggling to come to terms with what happened to him and at a time when the world is focused on understanding the significance of looking after our mental health, this did not feel like a press conference that should have taken place.
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