{"id":83609,"date":"2025-05-15T16:16:47","date_gmt":"2025-05-15T20:16:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/?p=83609"},"modified":"2025-05-15T16:16:47","modified_gmt":"2025-05-15T20:16:47","slug":"alexander-zverev-falls-in-rome-and-continues-his-2025-struggles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/2025\/05\/15\/alexander-zverev-falls-in-rome-and-continues-his-2025-struggles\/","title":{"rendered":"Alexander Zverev Falls in Rome and Continues His 2025 Struggles"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>To sum up Alexander Zverev\u2019s 2024 season, it\u2019s enough to say that he finished ahead of a player who won two Grand Slams\u2014<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/2025\/01\/29\/carlos-alcaraz-set-to-make-tokyo-open-debut-in-2025\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">Carlos Alcaraz<\/a>. It was no fluke, as the German displayed incredible consistency: he reached the last 16 in all nine ATP Masters 1000 events, made the final at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rolandgarros.com\/en-us\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">French Open<\/a>, won two titles (Rome and Paris), and compiled an impressive 69\u201321 record. Everything pointed to 2025 being his year, and his early wins\u2014culminating in a run to the Australian Open final\u2014seemed to confirm that.<\/p>\n<p>However, it took just one loss to derail everything. That loss came against <a href=\"https:\/\/www.atptour.com\/en\/players\/jannik-sinner\/s0ag\/overview\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jannik Sinner<\/a> in the Melbourne final, where Zverev was beaten in straight sets. Once again, his long-awaited first Major slipped through his fingers. From that point on, he began to struggle significantly and was never able to produce tennis worthy of the world No. 2.<\/p>\n<h2>Missed Chances and Missteps<\/h2>\n<p><a id=\"24TkRXlUQ5dN2YAcokZPSg\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/2215184218\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'24TkRXlUQ5dN2YAcokZPSg',sig:'KZpdYW3V1d1-ZpOs8GWJ5IcaMENkb3mN7qnp48lWamk=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'2215184218',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n<p>After the Australian Open, he made the questionable decision to play the South American clay-court swing, where he suffered disappointing losses to Argentinians Francisco Cer\u00fandolo and Francisco Comesa\u00f1a. He was also upset in the first round of Acapulco by American youngster Learner Tien.<\/p>\n<p>What truly raised alarms was the fact that all of that happened after Jannik Sinner received a three-month suspension, opening a clear path for Zverev to aim for the No. 1 spot\u2014a career-defining opportunity. Ironically, that very pressure may have contributed to a string of poor performances. Later on, he failed to reach the quarterfinals in the following Masters 1000 events he entered: Indian Wells, Miami, Monte Carlo, and Madrid.<\/p>\n<p>Yes, he did win the title in his hometown of Munich, gaining both 500 ranking points and a temporary boost in confidence. But even there, he never really looked like a player who was back on track.<\/p>\n<h3>Zverev\u2019s Attitude in Question<\/h3>\n<p>Worst of all, he doesn&#8217;t seem willing to acknowledge what he\u2019s going through. For example, when asked in <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/2025\/05\/14\/the-italian-open-seems-to-have-a-problem-with-bettors\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">Rome<\/a> about his slump, he lashed out at a journalist, accusing him of \u201casking stupid questions.\u201d In Rome, he reached the quarterfinals but lost to Lorenzo Musetti in straight sets, despite serving for the first set at 6\u20135, 40\u20130. Did he take responsibility? Of course not. He blamed the balls, saying: \u201cThey were a real disaster. For someone like me, who seeks quick points with aggressive shots, it&#8217;s not easy.\u201d He also failed to credit his opponent: \u201cMusetti did his job, as he always does on clay\u2014defends well and waits for the opponent\u2019s errors.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Zverev RUDE to Reporter &quot;That is a STUPID Question!&quot; - Rome 2025\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/FJhVMPvhr0M?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3>Zverev&#8217;s Future and the French Open<\/h3>\n<p>Heading into Roland Garros, Zverev is still considered one of the contenders\u2014behind Sinner and Alcaraz, of course\u2014but it wouldn\u2019t be surprising to see him exit early, given his current form.<\/p>\n<p>What should he do? First of all, be honest with himself. He needs to develop a sense of self-criticism, rather than constantly looking for someone else to blame. His game is certainly effective, but his tendency to play passively in key moments has cost him dearly. It\u2019s no coincidence that he\u2019s never taken that final step to reach the very top.<\/p>\n<p>Time is still on his side\u2014he\u2019s only 28\u2014but if he wants to make real progress, a change in mindset is needed.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo: Robert Deutsch-<em>Imagn Images<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>To sum up Alexander Zverev\u2019s 2024 season, it\u2019s enough to say that he finished ahead of a player who won two Grand Slams\u2014Carlos Alcaraz. It was no fluke, as the German displayed incredible consistency: he reached the last 16 in all nine ATP Masters 1000 events, made the final at the French Open, won two [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5454,"featured_media":74186,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2,9],"tags":[85,12397,2893,259,2883,2872,42736,6457,2886],"class_list":["post-83609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-atp","category-featured","category-news","tag-alexander-zverev","tag-atp-italian-open","tag-atp-rome","tag-atp-tour","tag-german-tennis","tag-italian-open","tag-news","tag-tennis-news","tag-zverev"],"modified_by":"Steen Kirby","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5454"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83609"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83609\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83612,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83609\/revisions\/83612"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}