In February 2024, Stefanos Tsitsipas dropped outside the Top 10 for the first time since making his debut in March 2019. More unexpected losses followed as he played some of the worst tennis of his career. In Indian Wells, he was demolished by Denis Shapovalov, who has been in a slump for quite some time and was ranked outside the Top 100. At that time, it looked like things would only go downhill for Tsitsipas. The good thing for him was that his favourite time of the year was coming and a chance to redeem his season. He grabbed that opportunity with both hands.
After a bad period of over a year, Tsitsipas finally broke the drought at the Monte Carlo Masters where he beat three Top 10 players to win the title. He backed that title run with a final in Barcelona. He lost unexpectedly to Thiago Monteiro in Madrid. Still, he must have been exhausted after playing many matches for two weeks in a row and Monteiro played the match of his life.
Madrid is known to have the most unorthodox clay, so the tournament results suggest almost nothing for Roland Garros, where the surface is different and slow. Slow clay surfaces like Monte Carlo, Rome and Roland Garros are ideal for Tsitsipas. His heavy forehand is great and has the power to hit through his opponents and his return and backhand are not liabilities. He needs time on his shots and he gets it on clay.
One Of The Favourites To Win Roland Garros
Stefanos Tsitsipas has reignited his form since the clay season began and is playing as good as ever. The Greek star has accumulated the most points out of anyone in the European clay season so far and has a good chance to win his first Grand Slam in Paris. Tsitsipas’ game depends a lot on match-ups. He is great against players who like to play with a lot of topspin. Against them, he can dictate with his amazing forehand. He played great in Rome and looked confident the whole week and his backhand was solid.
Then he ran into Nicolas Jarry, who made it tough for Tsitsipas with his huge groundstrokes and big serves. It’s tougher to get the ball up on tall players like Jarry or Jan-Lennard Struff and Tsitsipas is not the best first-serve returner either so when a player has a great serve, he struggles. His backhand slice is also not good and looks forced rather than fluent.
Tsitsipas will still fancy his chances against the taller players in a best-of-five environment with the way he has played this clay season. With what looks like a wide-open Roland Garros, you give him the right draw and match-ups and he’s one of the favorites to win.
Main Photo Credit: Susan Mullane-USA TODAY Sports
