Turin (Italy) – Current number 5 in the world, his best career position in the rankings, Russian Andrey Rublev arrives at this year’s ATP Finals on the outside. At least that’s what the tennis player himself believes, placing himself as an underdog in a tournament that brings together the best eight of the season, even after making the semis in 2022.
“It was a great moment to be in the semi-finals of one of the best tennis tournaments. Being part of this was special. I remember when I won, the emotions were crazy. This won’t happen often. Of course I will do everything possible to be able to feel that emotion again, but we will see. They are the best players, everyone wants to win and they play in a surreal way”, said the Russian.
Rublev sees himself running on the sidelines when it comes to the title fight, “Of course if I play against (Novak) Djokovic or (Carlos) Alcaraz I will do my best to try to compete against them and have the opportunity to win. But it’s very difficult, they are better than me and they have proven this for many years. So we’ll see. For that to happen I really need to play my best tennis”, he commented.
In the group draw, held this Thursdayhe fell into the Red Group along with Alcaraz, compatriot Daniil Medvedev (champion in 2020) and German Alexander Zverev (two-time champion in 2018 and 2021).
For the Russian, winning the Monte Carlo Masters 1000, his biggest title so far, made all the difference in the season. “At the beginning of the year I felt like I was doing good things in training, but I wasn’t winning anything big, I had strange feelings. But then Monte Carlo came and gave me confidence that the work I was doing was right,” said Rublev,
“Then, a few results later and reaching the final in Shanghai showed that I made the right decisions together with my team and made me even more confident”, said the Chinese Masters 1000 runner-up, who later made the semis at the ATP 500 in Vienna and at the Masters 1000 in Paris, losing to the Italian Jannik Sinner in Austria and the Serbian Novak Djokovic in France.
