Zverev wins in Madrid and climbs from 7 to 4 in the JFB Ranking

10Mai
von Jürgen Fritz

By Jürgen Fritz, Mon 10 Mai 2021, Cover picture: © JFB

Alexander Zverev has won the Masters tournament in Madrid (C) for the second time since 2018. It was his first major title above the ATP 500 category (D) in two and a half years. As a result, the German climbs from 7 to 4 in the JFB 52 Week Tennis World Ranking, while his final opponent Matteo Berrittini moves from 17 to 12, Madrid semi-finalist Casper Ruud from 15 to 13 and quarter-finalist Alexander Bublik from 31 to 26.

Zverev’s 15th tournament victory and fourth Masters title

For two and a half years, since his victory at the ATP Finals (B) in November 2018, Alexander Zverev has not been able to win any of the 14 biggest tennis tournaments. Although he won an ATP 250 (E) tournament in 2019 and even two E tournaments in 2020, and finally a D tournament (ATP 500) again this year in Acapulco, he has also played stronger and more consistently in the four Grand Slam events (A) since 2020 and reached the final of an A tournament for the first time at the US Open last September. However, he was unable to win the final, losing to Dominic Thiem. At the ATP Finals, he was 2019 and 2020 unable to repeat his success of 2018 and he had lost all of his last three Masters finals: in Rome 2018 against Rafael Nadal, in Shanghai 2019 and Paris 2020 both against Daniil Medvedev. For three years he did not succeed, to add a fourth to his three Masters titles (C) from 2017 and 2018. Until last night.

After the 24-year-old had beaten clay-court king Rafael Nadal 6-4, 6-4 in the quarter-finals and Dominic Thiem, the second-best clay player in recent years, just as smoothly 6-3, 6-4 in the semi-finals, the time had finally come and Zverev also defeated Italy’s Matteo Berrittini 6-7, 6-4, 6-3 in the final. Neither of them could quite match their performances in the previous rounds last night, but Zverev impressed above all with mental strength, taking the loss of the first set 8-10 in the tiebreak after 70 minutes of play, simply staying on the ball and then taking command more and more from the end of the second set onwards, finally winning the match after 2:40 hours. This was already Zverev’s 15th tournament victory and his fourth Master title.

Of all active players, only Djokovic, Nadal, Federer and Murray have won more Masters tournaments than Alexander Zverev

This puts the 24-year-old German far ahead among the current top players under 25. Even among players under 30, only 27-year-old Dominic Thiem has won more tournaments than Zverev. Alexander Zverev is the only active player under 25 who has already won more than ten tournaments, eight of them higher-ranked (A to D), one more than Dominic Thiem, who is a good three and a half years older and has won seven higher-ranked tournaments so far (Medvedev 5, Rublev 4, Tsitsipas 2).

And of all the active players in the world, only Djokovic (36), Nadal (35), Federer (28) and Murray (14), who are all well over 30, have won more Masters tournaments than Zverev.

Masters 1000 Titles

Instagram-US Open-Screenshot

Still active players with the most ATP tournament wins

A tournaments: the four Grand Slam events – B tournaments: the Olympic Games and the ATP Finals – C tournaments: the nine Masters 1000 – D tournaments: the 13 ATP 500s – E tournaments: the 40 or so ATP 250s

  1. Roger Federer (39 years): 103 tournament wins ==> 20 A – 6 B – 28 C – 24 D – 25 E
  2. Rafael Nadal (34): 87 tournament wins ==> 20 – 1 – 35 – 22 – 9
  3. Novak Djokovic (33): 82 tournament wins ==> 18 – 5 – 36 – 14 – 9
  4. Andy Murray (33): 46 tournament wins ==> 3 – 3 – 14 – 9 – 17
  5. Juan Martin del Potro (32): 22 tournament wins ==> 1 – 0 – 1 – 9 – 11
  6. Marin Cilic (32): 18 tournament wins ==> 1 – 0 – 1 – 2 – 14
  7. Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (36): 18 tournament wins ==> 0 – 0 – 2 – 2 – 14
  8. Dominic Thiem (27): 17 tournament wins ==> 1 – 0 – 1 – 5 – 10
  9. Stan Wawrinka (36): 16 tournament wins ==> 3 – 0 – 1 – 3 – 9
  10. Alexander Zverev (24): 15 tournament wins ==> 0 – 1 – 4 – 3 – 7
  11. John Isner (36): 15 tournament wins ==> 0 – 0 – 1 – 0 – 14
  12. Richard Gasquet (34): 15 tournament wins ==> 0 – 0 – 0 – 0 – 15
  13. Gilles Simon (36): 14 tournament wins ==> 0 – 0 – 0 – 1 – 13
  14. Kei Nishikori (31): 12 tournament wins ==> 0 – 0 – 0 – 6 – 6
  15. Daniil Medvedev (25): 10 tournament wins ==> 0 – 1 – 3 – 1 – 5
  16. Gael Monfils (34): 10 tournament wins ==> 0 – 0 – 0 – 3 – 7
  17. Sam Querrey (33): 10 tournament wins ==> 0 – 0 – 0 – 2 – 8

And in comparison, the most successful U25 players so far after Zverev:

  • Andrey Rublev (23): 8 tournament wins ==> 0 – 0 – 0 – 4 – 4
  • Stefanos Tsitsipas (22): 6 tournament wins ==> 0 – 1 – 1 – 0 – 4

And the Madrid finalist:

  • Matteo Berrittini (25): 4 tournament wins ==> 0 – 0 – 0 – 0 – 4

The last five B and C tournaments all went to players who were under 25 at the time of their victory

With his fourth tournament win since play resumed in August 2020, Zverev rises from 7 to 4 in the JFB Ranking. Apart from Andrey Rublev, no other player has won as many singles tournaments in the last 52 weeks as Alexander Zverev (Rublev and Medvedev also won the ATP Cup in addition to their four and three team singles titles respectively).

And something else stands out: The last five B and C tournaments all went to players who were under 25 at the time of their victory:

  • Paris (C) in November 2020: Daniil Medvedev (24)
  • ATP Finals (B) in November 2020: Daniil Medvedev (24)
  • Miami (C) in March/April 2021: Hubert Hurkacz (24)
  • Monte Carlo (C) in April 2021: Stefanos Tsitsipas (22)
  • Madrid (C) in May 2021: Alexander Zverev (24)

JFB 52 Week Tennis World Rankings as of 10 May 2021

And here’s how the JFB 52 Week Tennis World Rankings look after Madrid:

2021-05-10-A

2021-05-10-B

(c) JFB

The category Tournaments played actually indicates the tournaments played in the last 52 weeks and is not, as with the ATP, a constructed number in which tournaments are counted in which a player did not compete at all, but in the opinion of the ATP should have competed. Listed are all professional tournaments in which a player actually started in the last 52 weeks, not only Grand Slam and ATP tournaments, but also Challenger and Future tournaments.

The Win-Loss section also includes all wins and losses in the last 52 weeks, including those in Challenger, Future and Qualifying tournaments, in order to have a real overview of how many matches the players have played. And in Titles, all tournament wins in the last 52 weeks in men’s professional tournaments are actually listed, also in the team competitions (T) of the Davis Cup and ATP Cup and in Challenger (F, G, H) and Future tournaments (I).

Here you can read how the JFB 52 Week Tennis World Ranking works.

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