Looking for Tennis and Racket Sports International News?

Alexander Bublik moved to within one win of capturing his first grass-court tour-level title on Saturday when he defeated home favourite Alexander Zverev 6-3, 7-5 at the Terra Wortmann Open.

The 25-year-old produced a strong serving performance at the ATP 500 event, firing 14 aces and winning 94 per cent (32/34) of points behind his first delivery to advance against the German after 88 minutes.

[ATP APP]

With his win, Bublik improved to 3-1 in his Lexus ATP Head2Head series against Zverev. Bublik lifted his only tour-level trophy in Montpellier in 2022, but will have the chance to add to his trophy haul when he meets Andrey Rublev or Roberto Bautista Agut in Sunday’s final.

Bublik is up 15 spots to No. 33 in the Pepperstone ATP Live Rankings following his run to the final in Halle, where he has also defeated Jannik Sinner and Jan-Lennard Struff. Bublik has often found his best level on grass, reaching title matches on the surface in Newport in 2019 and 2022.

In the first look at Season 1, Part 2 of Netflix’s Break Point, the focus turned to Serena Williams. As several of the show’s personalities said the American legend’s name, Patrick Mouratoglou asked, “Who?”

The Frenchman was joking, of course. Mouratoglou was Williams’ longtime coach. In Break Point, however, he dished on far more than his former charge.

ATPTour.com looks at the best Mouratoglou moments from the Netflix series.

Patrick Dishes On Nick
The first two episodes of the batch focused on Wimbledon, with a lot of time spent on Nick Kyrgios and his breakthrough run to the final. The Australian’s talent has never been questioned, but could he put it together on the sport’s biggest stages?

“All his career so far, Nick has said, ‘I’m not practising, don’t expect anything from me’, because acting that way can just take away the pressure,” Mouratoglou said. “But now he realises that he can maybe win a major. If he starts to work, starts to be ambitious, the pressure suddenly takes him.”

The highs in tennis can be incredible and the lows can be crushing. That was clearly shown in Episode 8 of Break Point.

Ajla Tomljanovic suffered a devastating defeat in Episode 7, when she let slip her lead against eventual champion Elena Rybakina at Wimbledon. The Australian was so close to glory and yet so far.

But part of the beauty of professional tennis is that there is always the next tournament. It did not take long for Tomljanovic to earn her shot at redemption. The hustle and bustle of the US Open proved the perfect setting for her moment in the spotlight.

The legendary Serena Williams was poised to “evolve” away from tennis at the final major of the season. That became the focus of the tournament.

“If she’s playing her best, no one can beat her,” Tomljanovic said.

Karen Khachanov has withdrawn from Wimbledon due to a stress fracture he suffered at Roland Garros.

“Hello everyone, this is not an easy statement for me to write, but I have to inform you of my withdrawal from the upcoming Championships at Wimbledon,” Khachanov wrote on Instagram on Friday.

“Due to an unfortunate injury I picked up at the French Open (stress fracture and a partial fracture in sacrum S1 bone), I will not be able to participate at Wimbledon for the second year in a row. The decision to withdraw was not an easy one and I was hoping till the end during these few weeks that I would be able to recover however my medical team ensured me that in my case it wasn’t possible.”

Khachanov has made four appearances at Wimbledon, with his best result a run to the quarter-finals in 2021.

Taylor Fritz and Jiri Lehecka earned the most emphatic win of their run at the Cinch Championships on Friday to reach the final at The Queen's Club in London.

After scoring their first two victories via Match Tie-breaks, the unseeded American/Czech pairing knocked off top seeds Wesley Koolhof and Neal Skupski 6-3, 7-6(4) in the semi-finals. Fritz and Lehecka combined to hit 11 aces and saved three of the four break points against them in the win, while breaking twice on five chances.

Both Fritz and Lehecka are seeking their first tour-level doubles title, with only Fritz having previously played in a final. The American twice finished runner-up, in Basel with Reilly Opelka (2019) and in Los Cabos with Thanasi Kokkinakis (2018).

The second doubles semi-final at the ATP 500 event will be contested on Saturday, when second seeds Ivan Dodig and Austin Krajicek face Santiago Gonzalez and Edouard Roger-Vasselin.

[BREAK POINT]

Playing in a grass-court quarter-final for the first time on Friday, Carlos Alcaraz used a fast start and a strong finish to defeat Grigor Dimitrov at the Cinch Championships.

The Spaniard's 6-4, 6-4 victory extends his edge to 3-0 in the pair's Lexus ATP Head2Head and moves him to 5-4 lifetime on grass courts. With his first Top 30 win on the surface, he advances to the semi-finals for the eighth time in his nine events this season — his lone early exit coming in the Rome third round.

"The work that I put in, the matches that I played [at] a great level helped me a lot coming into this really tough match," Alcaraz said of his development on the grass. "Grigor is a top player in every surface, but I would say even more here on grass, he feels the ball really well.

"I just played really well from the beginning until the last ball."

[BREAK POINT]

Alcaraz improved to 8-0 in tour-level quarter-finals this season by winning six of the match's final seven games after falling behind 0-3 in the second set at The Queen's Club in London. After Dimitrov stopped a run of four straight games to break for 4-4, Alcaraz took advantage of a loose service game from the Bulgarian to storm through the finish line.

Roberto Bautista Agut delivered a clean-hitting performance Friday to upset top seed Daniil Medvedev at the Terra Wortmann Open.

The Spaniard downed Medvedev 7-5, 7-6(3) to earn his fifth Lexus ATP Head2Head win against the World No. 3, who defeated Bautista Agut last year in Halle en route to a finalist finish.

"I think to beat Daniil on this court, you have to play really good," Bautista Agut said in his on-court interview. "I did not feel good some months this year, but I kept working hard. I know tennis is sometimes very difficult, but today it showed up that I've been working hard. It showed up that a lot of things, I have been working on and I'm very happy because I played very good tennis."

Bautista Agut, 35, held the advantage in extended rallies and countered Medvedev’s deep return position by showcasing drop shots and closing points at net. A semi-finalist in Halle five years ago, Bautista Agut stated that his flat groundstrokes are part of the reason why he plays well on grass. 

"I think I can move well on grass, I think I'm fast," Bautista Agut said. "My shots are flat and the most important thing is that I enjoy playing on this surface."

Holger Rune overcame a stern test from Lorenzo Musetti on Friday to reach his sixth semi-final of the season at the Cinch Championships.

In their first tour-level meeting, the second seed defeated Musetti 6-4, 7-5 after one hour, 54 minutes. Rune won 54 per cent of points behind his second serve, compared to Musetti’s 29 per cent to advance to his first career grass-court semi-final.

"I enjoy it [on grass]. I think I'm starting to play better and better," Rune said in his post-match interview. "[It's] getting more challenging in every match and I think my mindset has been incredibly good these three matches. I've been able to come from a break behind and stay in the moment.

"Grass is also tough for the body. First few matches, every part of your body has to get used to it, the movement, the upper body, everything. So I was struggling a bit but I'm happy that I could finish and win a match."

Rune, who received treatment on his right wrist during the opening set, won five consecutive games after trailing 1-4. In the second set, the Dane saved two set points on serve at 4-5.

Two-time finalist Alexander Zverev moved to within two wins of capturing his first Terra Wortmann Open title on Friday when he defeated Chilean Nicolas Jarry 7-5, 6-3.

The German overcame Dominic Thiem and Denis Shapovalov in his first two matches and produced another consistent performance in front of his home fans in Halle, committing just 12 unforced errors to advance after one hour and 56 minutes.

There was only one key moment of difficulty for the the Zverev in the match. In the second set, he faced three break points at 4-2, but fended off the danger with big serving and powerful backhands to hold.

With his 24th win of the season, Zverev improved to 3-2 in his Lexus ATP Head2Head series against Jarry, avenging his May semi-final defeat against the 27-year-old in Geneva, where the Chilean won the title.

Zverev, who reached finals in Halle in 2016-17, is seeking his first title of the season since 2021, when he triumphed at the Nitto ATP Finals. Earlier this season, the World No. 22 reached semi-finals in Dubai, Geneva and Roland Garros.

Andy Roddick continued in his role as an expert analyst on Netflix’s Break Point in the newest batch of five episodes to close out Season 1.

The former World No. 1 shared his thoughts on several stars of the show including Nick Kyrgios. ATPTour.com looks at some of Roddick’s most memorable moments from the newest release of the series.

Roddick On Kyrgios
In the first episode of Break Point, Kyrgios partnered close friend Thanasi Kokkinakis to the Australian Open doubles title. In Episode 6, he carried confidence into Wimbledon.

“I don’t know any other person who’s ever won a doubles tournament and went, ‘You know what, now I can win a singles Slam.’ That’s a leap for me,” Roddick said of Kyrgios. “The pressure set is not the same.”

As the series detailed, the Australian put together the best singles performance of his career at Wimbledon, where he advanced to the final of a major for the first time. He ultimately fell short to Novak Djokovic in the final.

Could Nick Kyrgios go all the way at Wimbledon and win his first major title as a singles player?

That was the main theme of the seventh episode of Break Point, the second of the newly released batch. The episode picked up in the middle of the Australian’s showdown with Stefanos Tsitsipas, which was full of tension. After winning, Kyrgios walked off court and told the Netflix camera crew, “I can’t wait for this press conference bro.”

The pair traded barbs in the media, but all that mattered was that Kyrgios advanced through the draw.

For a talented player who had not always fulfilled his potential, a breakthrough performance seemed within arm’s reach. But perhaps the most intriguing moment of the episode came when the crew filmed Kyrgios — safely through to the semi-finals after defeating Cristian Garin — watching the end of the quarter-final between Rafael Nadal and Taylor Fritz. Interestingly the Australian admitted to preferring a showdown with Nadal, whom he called the “greatest of all time”.

The Spaniard won the match, but withdrew before the semi-finals. Suddenly, Kyrgios stood on the precipice of history, one victory from becoming Wimbledon champion. 

Carlos Alcaraz is one of the more experienced 20-year-olds ever to compete on the ATP Tour, his precocious talent already earning him four ATP Masters 1000 titles, a US Open crown and several stints atop the Pepperstone ATP Rankings.

But when it comes to grass, the Spaniard is still green.

Alcaraz entered the Cinch Championships with a 4-2 career record on the slick surface, but he's now through to his first grass-court quarter-final at The Queen's Club in London. As he builds his confidence on the lawns, he shared some insight into how he has developed his game.

In addition to watching videos to scout his opponents, Alcaraz has also been trying to emulate the likes of Roger Federer and Andy Murray in their grass-court movement. 

"I want to look up to the best players on grass and movers. On grass, Roger and Andy for me are the best players that are moving great on grass. So I want to be the same, like them," he said of the pair, who have 10 Wimbledon titles between them (eight for Federer, two for Murray).

“Rafa, you put me on tennis!”

Arthur Cazaux developed a love for tennis at a young age, when he was sitting at his home in southern France watching the-then 19-year-old Rafael Nadal compete at Roland Garros.

Little did Cazaux know that the Spaniard would someday become one of the sport’s greatest players and the Montpellier native would be a professional tennis player himself.

Becoming a pro was a childhood dream for the #NextGenATP Frenchman, who is making rapid progress on the ATP Challenger Tour.

[ATP APP]

Is Andrey Rublev rustling up another deep run at the Terra Wortmann Open? The 2021 finalist booked his spot in the last eight at the grass-court ATP 500 event on Thursday with a 7-6(5), 6-3 victory against Yannick Hanfmann.

Rublev delivered a solid display to hold off the World No. 53 Hanfmann and improve his record in Halle to 8-3. Home favourite Hanfmann had led 5/3 in the first-set tie-break but was unable to push on and forge a repeat of his victory in the pair’s fourth-round meeting last month at the ATP Masters 1000 event in Rome.

“The important thing was I was able to win against a tough player like Yannick,” said Rublev. “The last time he beat me and he’s playing better and better. Especially on grass, he’s even tougher to play against because he has such a good serve and a good game at the net. I was able to win the match in two sets so I’m really happy.”

Take a bow, Andrey! ?

? @AndreyRublev97 @ATPHalle | #TerraWortmannOpen pic.twitter.com/xS2v5Idgq3

After winning five of the final six points to claim the first-set tie-break, Rublev carried the momentum into the second second, in which he established an ultimately unassailable 4-0 lead. With the OWL Arena roof closed during the second set to shelter the court from the torrential Halle rain, Rublev pushed on to a one-hour, 39-minute triumph in which he converted three of his six break points.

Roland Garros champions Ivan Dodig and Austin Krajicek extended their winning streak to eight matches with a quarter-final victory on Thursday at the Cinch Championships. The Croatian-American team defeated British home favourites Lloyd Glasspool and Daniel Evans 6-4, 6-4 at The Queen's Club to continue their bid for a fourth tour-level title this season.

After surviving a Match Tie-break in the opening round, Dodig/Krajicek converted three of five break points to seal the straight-sets victory. They will meet Edouard Roger-Vasselin and Santiago Gonzalez in the semis after the unseeded pair upset third seeds Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury 7-5, 6-7(2), 11-9.

Top seeds Wesley Koolhof and Neal Skupski also advanced on Thursday with a 6-3, 7-6(5) win against Rohan Bopanna and Matthew Ebden. They will meet Wednesday winners Taylor Fritz and Jiri Lehecka for a place in the final.

[BREAK POINT]

Three Unseeded Teams Into Halle SFs
Three quarter-final matchups between unseeded teams were contested on Thursday at the Terra Wortmann Open, with two decided by Match Tie-breaks.

Gone from the ATP Tour, but still firmly in the minds of fans and players alike.

Roger Federer, a 10-time Terra Wortmann Open champion, was honoured in a special ceremony on centre court Wednesday at the grass-court ATP 500. It was the 103-time tour-level titlist’s first visit to a tennis tournament since his final match as a pro at the 2022 Laver Cup. For many, it was a happy reminder of what the Swiss great brought to life on Tour.

“Off court he was always extremely nice to everyone,” home favourite Alexander Zverev, who was beaten by Federer on the first of his two Halle championship-match appearances in 2017, told ATPTour.com. “He was a true gentleman, but he was still very, very private. He didn’t let a lot of people into his life, I think.

“On the court, it was always a joy to play him, because you knew the stadium would always be sold out, the crowd would always be on fire. So in that regard I think tennis misses him.”

Another home hope in the Halle field, Yannick Hanfmann, recalls Federer inspiring him as a young player.

Carlos Alcaraz bounced back with authority on Thursday at Queen's Club. 

Two days after the top seed was pushed to a final-set tie-break by Arthur Rinderknech, Alcaraz defeated 2022 Next Gen ATP Finals runner-up Jiri Lehecka 6-2, 6-3 to reach his first grass-court quarter-final at the Cinch Championships.

"I'm really happy with the level that I played today. Jiri is a great opponent, great shots," the Spaniard said in his on-court interview. "He has a great game on grass. I'm really happy with the level. I think I had a really solid match. I played my game, I enjoyed playing here and I'm really happy with my first quarter-final here in Queen's."

The 20-year-old began the week with a 4-2 tour-level record on grass in his young career, but he is quickly finding his footing on the surface. Alcaraz won in one hour and 25 minutes to set a clash in the last eight against former World No. 3 Grigor Dimitrov or eighth seed Francisco Cerundolo.

There was one key moment of difficulty for the Spaniard. In the second set, he faced three break points at 3-1. But Lehecka missed a forehand return and mishit a short forehand to let slip two of his opportunities, then Alcaraz snuffed out the other with a forehand winner. Those were the only break points he faced in the match.

Lexus, one of the world’s leading premium car brands, has become the Official Automotive Partner and Platinum Partner of the ATP Tour, from 2023.

The major multi-year partnership will see Lexus build out tournament partnerships in key markets, engaging premium fan demographics as Official Car across a portfolio of ATP Tour events. This is in addition to the recently announced partnership between Lexus and the LTA in the United Kingdom, including the Cinch Championships (Queen’s) and Rothesay International (Eastbourne), as well as the Fayez Sarofim & Co. U.S. Men's Clay Court Championship (Houston). ATP and Lexus will also work together to establish additional partnerships with ATP tournaments and players, from this season.

As a highlight, from 2023, Lexus becomes Platinum Partner and Official Automotive Partner of the Nitto ATP Finals, to be held from November 12 to 19 in Turin, Italy. Lexus will provide a fleet of electrified models, including the new all-electric Lexus RZ 450e, to support transportation of players, officials, and other guests during the tournament.

Lexus will also receive year-round brand exposure across ATP Tour’s fast-growing digital and social platforms, including Title Partnership of ATP Head2Head, a popular interactive feature that enables fans to explore rivalries between players on Tour.

Lexus is a pioneer in electrification in the premium car industry, building towards a holistic sustainable mobility vision, called Lexus Electrified. The brand’s comprehensive electrified portfolio includes self-charging electric hybrid, plug-in electric hybrid, and all-electric models. Promoting the use of such models during ATP tournaments, in 2023 and beyond, aligns with the ATP Tour’s climate ambitions under ATP Serves and UN Sports for Climate Action, which includes a Net Zero emissions target by 2040.

Jannik Sinner is digging deep on the Halle grass at the Terra Wortmann Open.

The fourth seed held off the powerful Lorenzo Sonego on Thursday for a 6-7(4), 6-4, 6-4 second-round triumph at the ATP 500. Sinner saved all eight break points he faced in an intriguing two-hour, 52-minute encounter inside OWL Arena to reach his ninth tour-level quarter-final of the year.

Incredible court coverage ?️

? @janniksin @ATPHalle | #TerraWortmannOpen pic.twitter.com/u8cYycSdAr

It was the second three-set win in a row on event debut for Sinner, who was pushed the distance by Richard Gasquet in his opening match. The 21-year-old will next play the winner between home favourite Jan-Lennard Struff and Alexander Bublik.

More to follow…