For Matteo Arnaldi, one of the biggest moments of his year happened away from the tennis court.
The Italian recently married Mia Savio in his hometown of Sanremo, Italy, celebrating their relationship with a multi-day wedding surrounded by family and friends from Italy, Australia and beyond.
The celebrations were held at Villa Ormond, with the gathering bringing together the couple’s different backgrounds. Arnaldi’s Italian roots and Savio’s Australian heritage were reflected throughout the occasion, giving the wedding a distinctly international feel.
The couple also included several meaningful personal touches in their ceremony. Arnaldi wore a bracelet that had belonged to Savio’s late father, while their wedding cake was specially designed to resemble the one served at Savio’s parents’ wedding.
Their relationship began in Perugia in 2022, when Arnaldi was competing at an ATP Challenger event and Savio was in Italy through an exchange programme. What started as a chance meeting eventually developed into a relationship that led to their engagement and, now, marriage.
For Arnaldi, the celebrations offered a rare break from the demanding schedule of professional tennis. The 37th-ranked player in the PIF ATP Rankings, though, had little time to stay away from competition.
He was quickly back on court at the ATP 500 event in Tokyo, where he faced defending champion Carlos Alcaraz in the second round on Saturday.
Alcaraz entered the meeting with a 2-0 advantage in their Lexus ATP Head2Head record, giving Arnaldi another demanding challenge as he returned to the tour following his wedding.
While the result on court was another chapter in his professional career, Arnaldi’s recent wedding marked an important milestone away from tennis, bringing together two families and two cultures as he and Savio began the next stage of their lives together.
