The tennis champion remains among a select trio of Italian men to secure a major singles title.
Italian sport mourns a true icon: Nicola Pietrangeli, a double French Open champion, passed away at ninety-two.
The player made history by emerging as the first Italian to secure a Grand Slam singles title, achieving his initial triumph at the French Open in 1959 and successfully defending the prestigious trophy in 1960.
With a remarkable 48 career titles, Pietrangeli was widely considered the nation's greatest ever player until the rise of current world number two and four-times major winner Jannik Sinner.
"The sport in Italy is mourning an icon. Nicola Pietrangeli, the sole Italian enrolled in the World Tennis Hall of Fame, has passed away," stated the Italian Tennis Federation.
Alongside his two French Open successes, Pietrangeli also finished as runner-up in Paris in both 1961 and 1964.
He holds a remarkable 164 matches played for Italy in the Davis Cup, winning 120 of them, and spearheaded his country to its first title in 1976.
Organisers of the Italian Open, an event where he was a double winner, stated: "We are profoundly saddened that we say goodbye to Nicola Pietrangeli, a veritable legend of Italian tennis..."
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