Dropping only one set all week, Djokovic won his fifth Italian Open title on Monday after beating Diego Schwartzman 7-5, 6-3 in the final, and restored his confidence heading into Roland Garros, which starts in six days.
Halep, who lost the 2017 and 2018 Rome finals to Elina Svitolina, extended her record in tennis’ restart to 10-0.
Exactly two weeks after he was defaulted from the U.S. Open, and a day after he was warned by the chair umpire for breaking his racket, Djokovic received an obscenity warning midway through a 7-5, 6-3 win over Casper Ruud
Muguruza struggled with her serve and double faulted on the final two points of the 2 hour, 16-minute match.
Nadal’s first tournament back ended with a 6-2, 7-5 loss to Diego Schwartzman while Djokovic earned a verbal warning for smashing his racquet through a 6-3, 4-6, 6-3 win over Dominik Koepfer.
When Djokovic was broken at love to even the second set at 3-3, he slammed his racket to the red clay in anger.
The unseeded Indo-Canadian pair fought hard before going down 6-4 5-7 7-10 to Chardy-Martin pair in the tie-breaker late on Friday.
On Friday, Djokovic defeated his fellow Serb Filip Krajinovic 7-6 (7), 6-3 to enter the last eight of the tournament for the 14th straight year.
It would take Djokovic quite a bit more work before he finally closed out the first set in 1 hour, 28 minutes and went on to finish off a 7-6 (7), 6-3 victory for a spot in the Italian Open quarterfinals for the 14th straight year on Friday.
Halep, who is actually on an 11-0 run overall stretching back to February, recovered an early break in the opening set and then overpowered her 29th-ranked opponent the rest of the way.
Because of concerns amid the coronavirus pandemic, Nadal preferred not to travel to New York for the ongoing U.S. Open. He last played in February, when he won a tournament in Acapulco, Mexico.
The Italian Open normally takes place during the second week in May, but the pandemic required the professional tennis calendar to be reshuffled, with several events suspended or reduced in scope.
This year's edition of the tournament had been scheduled to start at the Foro Italico on May 11, but was called off because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The ATP Tour approached Rome organizers with an expansion proposal and offered to cover the extra prize money that would be required, Italian Tennis Federation president Angelo Binaghi said Wednesday.
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