This year’s Tennis season like all other sports has been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The oldest and the most famous tennis tournament of all i.e. Wimbledon was canceled this year. This was the first time since Word war 2 that such a thing happened. Of course, the US Open and French open was rescheduled and played without or limited public participation.
On the court, Novak Djokovic was the most dominating player. He is already assured of finishing No 1 for a record-equalling 6 times. He started the year by winning the first-ever ATP cup for country Serbia and then winning the Australian open beating Dominic Theim in the Final. in fact, he was unbeaten for most of the year and maintained a very healthy lead over everyone for the No1 ranking. It was nice to see someone other than the Big 3 i.e. Dominic Theim finally win a Grand slam but Djokovic fans could argue that if Djokovic had not defaulted he might have won the US Open. At the Roland Garros, the King of Clay Rafa Nadal continued to show why he is considered G.O.A.T by winning a record-equalling 20th Grand slam
At the ATP tour-level i.e. ATP masters 1000, ATP 500, and ATP 250 many tournaments were canceled or had to reschedule which affected many lower-ranked players financially since they could not play. For both the US Open and French Open the build-up tournaments were severally curtailed this year unlike during the normal year where a whole host of tournaments would be played before each Grand slam.
This year’s breakout star of the year without a doubt has to be Andrey Rublev. He has won most ATP titles this year i.e. 5. He started the year 2020 with a bang by winning 2 titles in consecutive weeks in Adelaide and Auckland. He then had reasonable success by reaching the Australian Open. It was in the second half of the year after tennis resumed after the lockdown that Rublev really had an impressive run. He had moderate success in the US Open by reaching the Quarterfinals. He then won a clay-court tournament in Hamburg before again reaching another Quarterfinal at the french open. Since then he has gone on to win 2 more titles in St Petersburg and Vienna and he has qualified for the Year-end championship in London. In fact, Rublev in 2020 is much similar to fellow Russian Medvedev was in 2019 on the ATP tour
Fun fact When asked Who would be the breakout star of the year, Roger Federer had correctly predicted Rublev
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsnFpsj3pms
So as tennis season winds down with only Paris masters and ATP year-end championship left the Next-gen consisting of alexander Zverev, Stefano Tsitsipas, and Medvedev would like to improve and challenge the Big 3 for the slams next year.
So what was your favorite Tennis moment of the Year .Let us know in the comments?