Men’s tennis feels more open than ever – but at the Grand Slams, it’s a false dawn

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Welcome back to the Monday Tennis Briefing, where The Athletic will explain the stories behind the stories from the past week on court.

This week, the Madrid Open brought a coaching comeback story, a reminder of the growth required to be a tennis prodigy and a reminder of a false dawn at the top of men’s tennis.

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A false dawn at the top of men’s tennis?

Discussing the state of the men’s game Saturday night, America’s world No. 17 Frances Tiafoe offered an interesting perspective. “Anybody can clip anybody on a given day,” he told reporters after beating Luciano Darderi to reach the Madrid Open third round.

“I think this is exciting times. Tennis reminds me right now of 2000 to 2004 or 2005, there’s a window. Anybody can win Slams, anybody can win tournaments like this. Every Masters, we’ll probably have eight, nine (possible) winners.”

That period at the start of the 21st century will always be remembered as an interregnum, when Pete Sampras was on the wane and Roger Federer hadn’t yet fully arrived. Between Wimbledon in 2001 and the French Open in 2004, six players, including Thomas Johansson, Albert Costa and Gaston Gaudio, won their one and only Grand Slam title.

Does what’s happening now resemble that kind of openness? Yes and no.

At ATP Masters 1,000 level, the rung below the Grand Slams, things have definitely been unpredictable over the last year. Going back to Monte Carlo in 2024, the last 10 events have been won by eight different players, with five different winners in the last five.

At the Grand Slams, however, the shop remains as closed as it ever did. Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz have won the last five between them; Alcaraz, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic won the eight prior.

While there is an important difference from the Big Three era, with players like Tiafoe and last year, Taylor Fritz expressing hope that they can win a major because they can beat even the best in the world, an as-yet unbreakable ceiling remains at the very top.

“I lived the real era, so for me, it feels great,” Tiafoe said of the tennis environment when Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic were at their best. He recalled playing Nadal in the Australian Open quarterfinals in 2019 and feeling that “in my mind, I’m not beating Rafa. But now you can play anyone and I really feel like at a Slam, anyone can win, not even just me, anyone”.

Still, it hasn’t happened yet. The feeling of openness might be illusory at the very biggest events in tennis, but at least the chasing pack are no longer going into majors resigned to their fate.

Charlie Eccleshare

Can Maria Sakkari sustain this return to form?

Maria Sakkari spent more than a year trying to find people who could help her solve her tennis problems.

Before those difficult 12 months, she had spent six years with Tom Hill, who was one of the youngest coaches on either tour when she took him on. Together they climbed the rankings to world No. 3, and Sakkari reached two Grand Slam semifinals in 2021. She said she hoped that he would be her coach for the rest of her career.

But after suffering a series of disappointing defeats, Sakkari sacked Hill early in 2024. She tried David Witt and then Raemon Sluiter, both of them coaches who have had significant success with other players, especially Witt, who previously coached Venus Williams and Jessica Pegula. He’s now with Tiafoe.

Sakkari also tried working with Ben Crowe, the high-performance coach who helped Ash Barty win three Grand Slam titles before she retired at 25. None of it really worked for her and she slid down to No. 82 in the rankings.

Then, before the Madrid Open, Hill returned to the fold after ending his 12-month partnership with Peyton Stearns of the U.S., and a week on, Sakkari is already in the middle of one of her best tournaments in a good while. She ended streak of eight consecutive losses against top-10 players when she beat the No. 6 seed, Jasmine Paolini, 6-2, 6-1 to reach the fourth round.

Maria Sakkari looks more confident than during the past 12 months on the clay courts of Madrid. (Clive Brunskill / Getty Images)

Sluiter said during an interview in March that Sakkari, who is one of the fittest athletes on the WTA Tour, was talented enough that her main issue was trusting herself and her shots.

“She can forget sometimes,” he said.

Sakkari, who is 29, has considered walking away from the sport on multiple occasions. It tortures her so. But she has always come back and said during an interview in March that she still believes she can get back to the top level of the game.

Hill helped her get there before. Maybe he can do it again.

Matt Futterman

How can Joao Fonseca learn his next tennis lesson?

Joao Fonseca, the 18-year-old Brazilian sensation, is going to win a lot of titles, and probably some pretty big ones. Blessed with a sledgehammer forehand, a backhand that he can redirect with ease and a high-kicking serve, his tennis ceiling is somewhere in the sport’s stratosphere.

But for the time being, he is still a teenager, and winning on the ATP Tour demands that players lift up their floors — and flaws — in tight moments. Fonseca is going to lose matches because of that, just as every young player trying to make it to the top of the sport has done and will do. Eighteen is also not the easiest time to be shouldering the tennis hopes and dreams of an entire country, and maybe even a continent, with Fonseca the most exciting men’s player Brazil has seen since three-time Grand Slam champion Gustavo Kuerten.

Fonseca, who had his breakthrough moment in February when he won the Argentina Open, has been trying to find his sea legs ever since. After a second-round loss to Tommy Paul in Madrid, he’s 4-4 in tour-level matches since that title in Buenos Aires, though he did win a Challenger Tour event in Phoenix after an early exit to world No. 5 Jack Draper at the BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells.

If there is a common thread to his losses, it’s that they all include losing a tight set, or even two of them, to an opponent who has been around the block and played a lot more tight sets than he has. As he did against Alex de Minaur in Miami, Fonseca clobbered Paul all over the court in Madrid, but when it came to the key points, he over-pressed when the move was to slowly wear down his opponent.

In the end, Paul beat Fonseca 7-6(7), 7-6(3) in a match that exemplified the next hump that the Brazilian has to get over. He held two set points in the first-set tiebreak, but lost them with errors as he went for big shots rather than stealing a page from the Djokovic playbook, which is to keep the ball in play and either get the error or succumb to a winner. Do not, under any circumstances, give points away for free.

In an interview in March, Fonseca said he knows the difference between winning at the Challenger level and consistently beating a top player.

“If you have the opportunities, when you just don’t take them, he’s just going to take the match from you,” he said.

He will learn.

Matt Futterman

How do new players find the fabled ‘locker room’?

The “locker rooms” on the tennis tours have not always been hospitable places. The WTA Tour’s has been characterized as home to various factions, with everyone in it for themselves. Certainly that was the perception around the turn of the century when Jon Wertheim’s 2001 book, “Venus Envy,” gave a behind-the-scenes glimpse of life on the professional tennis circuit.

Things aren’t so fractious now, but generally players still like to keep their distance from one another, typically spending their time at tournaments with their entourages.

Bianca Andreescu, who enjoyed a sudden breakthrough in 2019 when she won the U.S. Open at 19, this week spoke about creating a welcoming atmosphere. Over the last couple of years she has reached out to fellow breakout stars Mirra Andreeva and most recently Alex Eala to let them know that she’s available if they ever need anything.

Now 24 and rebuilding her career after a dreadful run of injuries, Andreescu says she doesn’t want the next generation of players to have the experience she did. “I’m going to be honest, I didn’t have anybody reach out to me and nobody was friendly with me on the tour, no one would say hi to me,” Andreescu, ranked No. 132, told a few reporters at the Madrid Open last week, where she lost in the second round to Elena Rybakina.

“And I told myself, no, I don’t want the next generation to feel that way. I know it’s a competitive environment, but at the same time, us women, we are the only ones that really understand each other as much as possible.”

Eala, who lost to defending champion Iga Świątek in Madrid, has spoken about how much Andreescu getting in touch meant to her.

Charlie Eccleshare

Shot of the week

Matteo Arnaldi scrambles his way to a break against Novak Djokovic.

Recommended reading:

📅 Coming up

🎾 ATP 

📍Madrid: Madrid Open (1000) featuring Alexander Zverev, Daniil Medvedev, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Jack Draper.

📺 UK: Sky Sports; U.S.: Tennis Channel 💻 Tennis TV

🎾 WTA

📍Madrid: Madrid Open (1000) featuring Aryna Sabalenka, Iga Świątek, Coco Gauff, Maria Sakkari.

📺 UK: Sky Sports; U.S.: Tennis Channel

Tell us what you noticed this week in the comments below as the men’s and women’s tours continue.

(Top photo: Getty Images; design: Eamonn Dalton)

This news was originally published on this post .

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