Flavio
Cobolli
Italy
·
Tennis
Date of birth | 6 May 2002 |
|---|---|
Age | 24 |
Nationality | Italy |
Discipline | Tennis Singles |
Football could easily have been the sport Flavio Cobolli ended up pursuing. Born in Florence and raised in Rome, he played right-back in the AS Roma youth system and remains a huge supporter of the club.
At 13, though, he had a decision to make. Football or tennis? He chose tennis and, as it turned out, made a pretty good call.
There was already plenty of tennis knowledge at home. His father Stefano had played professionally and would go on to coach Flavio, while Cobolli began making a name for himself as a junior, winning the boys' doubles title at Roland Garros alongside Dominic Stricker in 2020.
Climbing the rankings
Cobolli had to work his way up once he moved into the professional game, but by 2023 he was inside the world's top 100. A year later came another jump as he broke into the top 50.
Then the titles started to arrive.
The breakthrough season
Cobolli won his first ATP Tour trophy in Bucharest in 2025, beating Sebastian Baez in the final. He didn't have to wait long for another. In Hamburg, he defeated Andrey Rublev to add an ATP 500 title to his collection.
His best Grand Slam run at that point came at Wimbledon, where he made the quarter-finals, while the end of the season brought success with Italy as they lifted the Davis Cup for a third year in a row.
It was a season where everything changed for Cobolli. He wasn't simply climbing the rankings anymore – he was winning big matches and challenging deep into major tournaments.
A first Grand Slam final
There was more to come in 2026, with Paris producing the biggest run of his career. Cobolli reached his first Grand Slam final and pushed Alexander Zverev to five sets before eventually losing out. There was some consolation: his results at Roland Garros took him into the world's top 10 for the first time.
Cobolli operates on instinct and certainly isn't afraid to show his emotions on court. There's plenty of aggression in his game, too, particularly off the forehand, and there's no doubting that he enjoys a battle. Perhaps that's where a little of the footballer he might have become still comes through.