Shortly after his five-hour, 6-7 (6), 7-5, 4-6, 6-3, 6-8, Roland Garros loss to Stan Wawrinka, Stefanos Tsitsipas did what lots of players would do after a hard-fought match: He took to social media to give credit to his opponent.
However, instead of spewing the polite platitudes that players post all the time, Tsitsipas spoke seemingly straight from his heart.
"Today I felt something that I can’t really explain," he began his Instagram caption, which was every bit as long as the marathon match merited.
The entire thing is worth a read, but, in short, Tsitsipas said the match that transpired had transcended everything else in his tennis career, and that his battle with Wawrinka, to whom he was extremely complimentary, had profoundly changed him.