“Please say something to them”: Crowd chaos in Shanghai continues as Lorenzo Musetti loses cool again over fans’ coughing

Italy’s Lorenzo Musetti had a difficult outing in the fourth round of the Shanghai Masters. The 23-year-old suffered a defeat in the fourth round of the ongoing ATP 1000 event to Canada’s Felix Auger-Aliassime in straight sets with a score of 6-4, 6-4.

During the contest, Musetti was not only troubled by his opponent but also by people sitting in the arena. He went on to complain more than once to the chair umpire as a few people sitting in the arena started coughing. "I know I made a mistake and I said something wrong, but please say something to them,” said Musetti to the chair umpire while complaining about the crowd’s behaviour.

The episode was the continuation of what happened in the previous match, where Musetti, out of anger because of the fans coughing, ended up abusing the crowd sitting in the arena. "Those fu***ng Chinese... They cough all the time!" said Musetti, which left the people in shock who could have listened to him.

It was Musetti’s 15th defeat in 48 matches in 2025. During the match, Musetti was unable to compete with Auger-Aliassime as he committed 10 unforced errors, two more than his rival. On the other hand, Auger-Aliassime registered 23 winners, 12 more than Musetti.

Auger-Aliassime converted three break points as well. In comparison, Musetti failed to win a single break point in three attempts. In terms of the net points, Musetti came way short as well. He won just nine out of 20 net points. On the other hand, Auger-Aliassime won 23 out of 32 net points. Auger-Aliassime won 72 per cent of service points, whereas Musetti won just 59 per cent of service points while serving.

The win means that it will be Auger-Aliassime’s 11th quarterfinal in ATP 1000 events, whereas it is his 10th quarterfinal this year in various competitions. In the previous nine quarterfinals, Auger-Aliassime produced some impressive performances, coming out on top on eight occasions and suffering just one defeat.

That defeat came against the world number two Italy’s Jannik Sinner in the quarterfinal of the Cincinnati Masters where the four-time Grand Slam winner was simply unstoppable as he came out on top with a score of 6-0, 6-2. Despite being so consistent in reaching the quarterfinals of different events, Auger-Aliassime has only managed to win two titles in 2025.

His first competition was the Adelaide International in January, where he defeated Sebastian Korda in the final with a score of 6-3, 3-6, 6-1. Auger-Aliassime’s second title came soon after the Australian Open as he won the Open Occitanie in Montpellier, France, where he got the better of Aleksandar Kovacevic in the final with a score of 6-2, 6-7, 7-6. Talking after the match, Auger-Aliassime was clearly ecstatic with his performance against the eighth-seed player and expressed satisfaction with the fact that he is finally getting some consistent results, which is the product of the hard work he has done behind the scenes.

“[That was] ’inspired Felix’ I guess,” said Auger-Aliassime. “I felt like I was playing fast, but I was seeing the game slow. It’s weird when you get these kinds of nights. I’ve been trying to work my way there obviously for a while now, working on this type of game plan, but to execute it live on a match court at this stage against an opponent like this is a different story to practice. I’m very pleased, because to play like this means things are coming along nicely.”

Next up for Auger-Aliassime will be France’s Arthur Rinderknech, who cemented his spot in the quarterfinal of the mega-event after beating the Czech Republic’s Jiri Lehecka in the round of 16 in straight sets with a score of 6-3, 7-6. It will be the third meeting between the two players in professional tennis. In the previous two meetings, Auger-Aliassime had a clear advantage as he won on both occasions. Interestingly, both of those meetings came early this year. Their most recent meeting came in the round of 32 at the Cincinnati Open where Rinderknech was forced to retire in the second set because of a fitness concern.