Considering the number of times he was forced to stop due to injuries, Matteo Berrettini had to work a lot on the mental aspect to always return to the field believing in his rehabilitation path. Stefano Massari, his mental coach, revealed how shameful things were said about the Italian tennis player.
“With Matteo in this phase I do a different job not linked to the court, but inherent to his desire for knowledge through readings and films, which is a part that we have always taken great care of and which we are now following exclusively.
My human relationship with him is always one of great love and affection, the professional one has transformed. I have great regard and respect for Matteo as a human being.
I am convinced that if he is well, physically, he has every chance of returning to very high levels. It is clear that injuries have had a huge impact. If you get hurt and heal, then you get hurt again and heal… he has extraordinary strength but he is also exhausting like things. He is a very beautiful reference in this because he has the strength to get up again. The real champions are this thing here,” told Massari in an exclusive interview given to the Italian website Fanpage.it.
Berrettini mentioned Massari on more than one occasion, the mental coach who allowed him to overcome many complicated moments through a work of trust and discipline. Massari is one of the most respected experts in the world of sport and, throughout his career, has collaborated with athletes from different disciplines. Berrettini has received several criticisms for his private life or for the way he handled certain moments; criticism that is often severe, gratuitous and completely out of place.
“Today, champions are subjected to pressures that those of 20-30 years ago could not even dream of because there is a paradoxical development of social media. A champion must learn to manage this, and it is very difficult. We live in a wild world, in the worst sense of the word. You risk being torn to pieces and even in this Matteo Berrettini had great strength of mind, because opprobrious things were said and written about him. An insult to the human race, we are talking about the only Italian tennis player to reach the Wimbledon final, someone who opened a path for his other colleagues. There is no gratitude towards him, but only bar opinions in the majority on social media,” added Massari.
