Former Barclays ATP World Tour Finals champion and six-time Grand Slam winner Stefan Edberg has hailed the introduction of the Next Gen ATP Finals from 2017 as a “great opportunity” for the rising stars of the game. The new ATP World Tour tournament, hosted in Milan, Italy, will feature the world’s top 21-and-under singles players each season. Edberg, who featured in a similar event back in 1985 called the Tennis World Young Masters, won his first ATP World Tour title in Milan (1984) and would relish the opportunity to feature in this new competition if he was a junior once again. “I think this is a great idea. It's good for tennis. It's great to promote these young players,” said...
There are so many firsts for you here, but more importantly for me, this is the first time in your career that you’ve had four straight-sets win. What does that say about your focus this week? Finally, I’m not having to squeak matches out like I have been. Like I said in Cary, I still wasn’t fully there mentally. I really buckled down this week after seeing my friend Darian King win the title in Tiburon, thinking I really could have won that. That got me locked in here and I was very business-like this week. This was a really good mental week for me. I dug in deep and took it to all my opponents. What does reaching the...
A LOOK BACK Stockton ATP Challenger (Stockton, California): In a battle of American #NextGen stars, third seed Frances Tiafoe picked up his second ATP Challenger Tour title of 2016 by defeating Noah Rubin, 6-4, 6-2. This was the fifth all-#NextGen final of the year, four of which involved Tiafoe. The Maryland native will make his debut in the Top 100 of the Emirates ATP Rankings on Monday, joining World No. 71 Taylor Fritz as the second 18-year-old American. At 18 years and eight months, No. 100 Tiafoe overtakes his countryman as the leader for the ATP Star of Tomorrow Award presented by Emirates. The youngest player in the year-end Top 100 will receive the special honour during the Barclays ATP...
This week’s $100,000 ATP Challenger Tour event in Tiburon, California, has long been known as one of the most respected tournaments on the calendar, but now it will also be known for holding a record that likely won’t be broken anytime soon. On Wednesday, Canadians Philip Bester and Peter Polansky won a marathon 20-18 second set tie-break in their opening round doubles match over Darian King of Barbados and American #NextGen star Frances Tiafoe. The 38-point tie-break is the longest in Challenger doubles since the ATP began keeping records for such doubles matches in 2007. Bester/Polansky saved multiple match points to prevail in the tie-break. Including ATP World Tour matches, it is the second-longest tie-break, only behind a 25-23 marathon in a...