Djokovic Battles Back to Beat Vacherot in Paris Opener and Keep Turin Hopes Alive

Novak Djokovic kept his season alive in Paris on Tuesday, battling from a set down to beat Valentin Vacherot 6-7, 7-5, 6-1 in the first round of the Paris Masters. The 10th seed, playing his first ATP 1000-level match since Indian Wells in March, looked in trouble when he dropped the opening tie-break 7-5 on Court Central, but he steadied in the second set, took it 7-5, and then ran away with the decider 6-1. The win matters beyond the result itself: Djokovic sits 11th in the race to the eight-man ATP Finals in Turin and needs a deep run in the final qualifying event to stay in contention. Vacherot, the man who stunned the tennis world by winning Shanghai as a qualifier, pushed the former world No. 1 hard, but Djokovic's experience told in the closing stages as he raised his level and cut out the errors. Elsewhere on Tuesday, Holger Rune, the 2022 Paris champion, lost 7-5, 6-4 to Tommy Paul on his return from injury, while Andrey Rublev's miserable run stretched to five straight defeats with a third-set tie-break loss to Tomas Martin Etcheverry. Djokovic's next test will show whether this comeback has real legs, but surviving a dangerous opener was the first box he had to tick.