Fighting back: After a challenging year, Zverev is only now threatening to look like the player that he was. | Getty Images
For Alexander Zverev, Saturday’s thrilling four-set victory over World No.12 Frances Tiafoe in the French Open third round was important in more ways than one. It was exactly 12 months ago that he had limped off Court Phillipe-Chatrier in tears after having hurt his ankle badly in the semifinal against Rafael Nadal.
The German was No.3 in the world and was playing the best tennis of his life, having outclassed Carlos Alcaraz in four sets in the quarterfinal and matched Nadal shot for shot until that fateful incident. Trailing 6-7(8), 6-6, his feet got stuck in the clay on a damp and humid evening in Paris, bringing to a shuddering halt a season that had promised much.
After returning to action in Australia at the start of 2023 – where he seemed severely undercooked – it is only now that the 2020 US Open finalist is threatening to look like the player he was a year ago. The gutsy win over Tiafoe marked a joyous anniversary of that gruesome Friday and it was also the first time he had beaten a top-15 opponent since Roland-Garros 2022.
“I’m happy to be through and be in the second week of a Grand Slam,” Zverev said in his post-match presser. “It’s, for sure, a great thing for me right now. I know what happened last year. It was emotional for me to step on that court for the first time when I played [Alex] Molcan, I’m not going to lie. But now I’m here to play some of the best players in the world, and today was definitely the case.”
‘1000km away’
Such optimism would have felt misplaced even as recently as a month ago. After his loss to Daniil Medvedev in the round-of-16 at the Rome Masters, Zverev felt he was a “1000km away” from even a decent level of tennis. “I just don’t win. I’m out earlier than I had hoped,” he told Sky Deutschland.
“I have to win and then that will solve [a lot of problems]. I don’t know what to say anymore. At the moment this year, I’m probably playing the worst tennis since 2015, 2016.”
It was worrying that Zverev’s despair came on clay, a surface that has been hospitable in the past. Three of his five ATP Masters 1000 titles have come on the dirt (Rome 2017, Madrid 2018 & 2021) and he has reached the quarterfinal or better in four of the five French Open editions starting 2018, a record he has at no other Major.
Like Medvedev, Zverev is a big-serving counter-puncher, and despite being 6’6”, he moves as well as anybody and has unusually good return performances. These skills have helped him seamlessly transition from hard courts – his preferred surface – to clay.
This was especially evident last season when he went semifinal-final-semifinal-semifinal across Monte Carlo, Madrid, Rome and Paris. In 2023 though, until the ATP 250 in Geneva the week before Roland-Garros began, he hadn’t made a single clay quarterfinal. As points from the previous year kept dropping off, Zverev was in great danger of falling outside the top-50.
Turning the tide
The past fortnight has, however, lifted his spirits. Following the defeat of Tiafoe, Zverev beat Bulgaria’s Grigor Dimitrov – a banana skin of a player – in straight sets on Monday to enter his first Slam quarterfinal since last year’s French Open. The 6-1, 6-4, 6-3 scoreline was deceptive at best, for the 26-year-old had to battle back from a break down in the second set and recover after surrendering a 3-0 lead in the third.
“I felt like at 3-0 in the third set I got very unfocused [sic]. I kind of thought the match was over before having it over [sic], and I was not concentrated [sic] anymore, and my serve went missing a little bit,” Zverev said in the press conference, explaining why he returned to the court after the win for some serving practice. “So I just wanted to get the feeling of having that back, because it’s going to be important.”
Zverev will now hope for this creditable run to have a happy ending. In the last-eight clash on Wednesday, he will be up against Argentina’s Tomas Martin Etcheverry, a 23-year-old who is in his first Major quarterfinal. On paper, it’s a winnable tie and the reward will be a mouth-watering semifinal against Casper Ruud or Holger Rune.
Assuming the draw holds, and Zverev indeed meets Ruud or Rune, he is not expected to be the favourite, for the Scandinavians are two of the best clay-courters around. A semifinal finish will however propel him back into the top-25, and with practically no points to defend after Roland-Garros, the only way for him will be up, with his quest for a maiden Slam back on track.
Open season
But the road ahead, like Dominic Thiem is discovering, will be challenging. Towards the end of 2021, when Zverev and Medvedev sparred, once at the Paris Masters and twice at the season-ending ATP Finals, they let out the vibes of a duopoly that could shape world tennis when the Big Three of Roger Federer, Nadal and Novak Djokovic make way.
Zverev had clinched the Tokyo Olympics gold and lifted the ATP Finals for a second time, while Medvedev had famously denied Djokovic the Grand Slam with a brilliant performance in the US Open final. But with the rise of Alcaraz, Ruud and Rune, it is back to being a crowded marketplace.
“If he [Zverev] is in top form, feels good and has confidence, there are only four or five players who can beat him,” former German No.1 Tommy Haas told Sport Bild in May. “[But] it is becoming increasingly difficult to achieve his major career goal – winning a Grand Slam tournament.
“The next star is here in Alcaraz. And you still have [Stefanos] Tsitsipas, Medvedev, Rune, [Jannik] Sinner, [Lorenzo] Musetti. The competition never sleeps.”