Men’s Tennis – 2021 Yearend Report and Predictions

It was an epic year for Novak Djokovic.  He claimed the first three legs of the Grand Slam – only the second time in the Open Era (since 1968) it has been accomplished.  It was also an epic year for Daniil Medvedev who made two slam finals, winning one – comprehensively dismantling the invincible Djokovic.  Alexander Zverev won an Olympic gold medal in singles and the ATP Finals.  This was also a breakout year for Jannik Sinner, Aslan Karatsev, Carlos Alcaraz, and Hubert Hurkacz. 

But perhaps the biggest news of all is that the stranglehold of the Big Three (or Big Four?) on the top has finally been broken.  Can they retrench in 2022?  Or will the floodwaters of new talent usher in a new era at the pinnacle of men’s tennis?

 

Players

Novak Djokovic – It’s hard to find sufficient superlatives to describe what he has accomplished in 2021.  In addition to the mind-boggling 27 straight match wins at the slams, he is the seven-time yearend #1 – an ATP record.  He is also the oldest ever ATP yearend #1 at age 34.  Pre-ATP computer (1973), we can find that Ken Rosewall was 36 at yearend for 1970, when he was ranked #1 by many journalists – although his position was far from clear – both Rod Laver and John Newcombe were strong candidates that year favoured by many.  Before that we have to go back to 1931 to Bill Tilden age 38 to find a less-disputed (although still not unanimous) #1.  But for Djokovic to accomplish this in the crucible of competition and depth that exists in 2021 is unprecedented.  That he was able to amass all these feats in the era of Nadal and Federer – who have largely been hailed during the last ten years as the two greatest players of all time – is even more incredible.  Even though all three currently sit at 20 slam titles, based on his other accomplishments, like two rounds of Golden Masters 1000’s (winning all nine tournaments twice), seven year-end #1 finishes, most computer weeks at #1, the Nole slam, etc.  I believe that Djokovic is the GOAT until some future player betters his records.

What does 2022 promise for the mighty Serb?  It would be almost impossible to repeat or better his slam run of 2021, but he still might win a slam or two.  The best possibilities are the Australian where he’s already won nine times, or Wimbledon where he’s the 3-time defending champ, but anywhere is possible – he’s appeared in the last five slam finals.  He seems a lot less interested in winning other tournaments – although he did take the Paris 1000 this year.  If he were to win only three or so tournaments this year, he could very well fall from the number one ranking.

 

Daniil Medvedev – is undoubtedly the number two of 2021.  The entertaining Russian began the year strongly with a runner-up performance at the Australian, and claimed titles at Marseilles and Mallorca.  He shored up some weaknesses in his game, finally winning a match at Roland Garros on his fifth main draw appearance, and then running all the way to the quarters.  But he really shone in late summer when he took the Canada 1000 and the US Open in straight sets over Djokovic, denying the grand slam.  It was the third time in history a slam has been denied in the final match – Jack Crawford in 1933 and Lew Hoad in 1956 also fell in the US Open final.  The villains on those days, Fred Perry and Ken Rosewall, arguably became greater than their victims, but it would be hard to imagine Medvedev eventually out-producing Djokovic.  At Medevedev’s age (25), Djokovic already had five slams (from nine finals) and 34 ATP tournament wins; Medvedev is 1 for 3 in slam finals and has 13 ATP titles.  Daniil ended the year strongly, making the final of the ATP Finals and leading his country to a Davis Cup victory.  He came perilously close to the official #1 ranking, and in the 12-month rolling rankings (like the kind that have always existed until the current ‘frozen’ rankings), he actually achieved #1 for three weeks in Oct/Nov.

Advancing to the official #1 ranking wouldn’t take much – an Australian Open title would suffice.  Who exactly is the best player on hard courts at the moment is up for debate.  Djokovic holds the Australian title, Medvedev the US Open, but Zverev won the Olympics and ATP Finals.  Winning two hard court slams in 2022 looks possible for Medvedev, but Djokovic’s unbeaten record in Aus Open finals exists for a reason.  Whoever can win the most slams in 2022 will probably take the yearend #1 ranking, and that could be Daniil.

 

Alexander Zverev – was beset by adversity off the court – troubles with sponsors and believable accusations of domestic violence.  But like a true sociopath he didn’t let it affect his on-court performance.  He rose to his highest ever yearend ranking, #3.  If his Olympic victory had counted for points, he would likely be ranked #2.  The tennis he displayed in the ATP Finals, taking down Medvedev and Djokovic in succession, was breathtaking.  Watching him play such steady and forcing tennis, one wonders how he can be beaten, why he is not claiming slams and the top ranking.  But it’s his mental game that sometimes gives way, like in his collapse when within sniffing distance of the 2020 US Open.  Still, his progress upward has been constant, and such is his talent, that it seems only a matter of time before he starts claiming slams regularly.  That could very well happen in 2022, and I actually consider him a strong threat for the #1 ranking.

 

Stefanos Tsitsipas – had a stellar opening half-year, taking out Nadal in a 5-set come-from-behind win in the Australian Open quarters, winning the Monte Carlo 1000, and making the final of Roland Garros.  In that final, he led Djokovic two sets to none, but the mighty Serb stormed back for the title.  The rest of his year is probably unfairly characterized by bathroom-break-gate, the controversy that ensued after his eight minute bathroom break in the first round of the US Open against Andy Murray.  Murray inflamed the situation with some sour grapes remarks to the press.  The ever-popular Greek was actually booed at the US Open over it.  Whether it was exhaustion, disappointment over his first slam final loss, or anguish over fan backlash from toilet-gate, Tsitsipas floundered the last six months, but hopefully can put it behind him and focus on tennis for 2022.  To me it seems his average level is a step below Djokovic-Medvedev-Zverev, but when he’s on his game at his most aggressive he can beat anyone. His best chance for slam glory is probably at the French, even if he is only the third or fourth best on clay.

 

Matteo Berrettini – has a monster game on grass – big serve and powerful ground strokes.  No wonder he made the Wimbledon final.  He’s 25 years old and may be near his peak.  In the absence of significant grass-court prowess from the Med-Zve-Tsi-etc cohort, another trip to the Wimbledon final for Berrettini looks reasonable.

 

Andrey Rublev – started the year well with a title in Doha. and runner-up in Monte Carlo after beating Nadal on clay.  But his level at the slams seems to top out at quarter-finals, which he has made four times. He made finals at Queen’s Club and Cincinnati, but then ended the year weakly, going 8-8 (w-l), until Davis Cup.  I suspect his ranking will drop in 2022.

 

Casper Ruud – was a surprise, rising from #11 to 7 in the 12-month rankings (27 to 8 in the frozen rankings).  He won five small tournaments, all at the 250 level, and all but one were on clay.  He hasn’t quite figured out the slams yet, having made only one round of 16.  I’ll look for him to make at least one quarter in 2022, probably at the French.

 

Hubert Hurkacz – was an even bigger surprise, rising from #36 to 8 in the 12-month rankings.  His year took off when he triumphed at the Miami 1000 beating four top 20 players.  Far from stopping there, he went on to the semis at Wimbledon taking out both Medvedev and Federer, and made the semis at the Paris 1000.  Consistency has not been his mantra, although it improved in the last half of the year and he was 3 for 3 in finals in 2021.  Given the depth of the field I won’t predict a lot of deep runs at slams, but Wimbledon, where so many struggle on the grass, might be a sweet spot for him.

 

Jannik Sinner – fulfilled the prediction I made last year that he would make the top 10, then a 19-year old ranked #20 in the 12-month rankings, #37 in the frozen official rankings.  All the signs were there.  In 2021 he won four titles from five finals, losing only the Miami 1000 to Hurkacz.  He made round of 16 at the French and US Opens, and I expect he will do even better in 2022.  By making the top 10 before age 20, he is in a very elite group, historically.  I’ll expect a slam triumph within three years.

 

Rafael Nadal – had an abbreviated year, playing only 29 matches.  He missed Wimbledon, the US Open, and the Olympics.  But when he played he was very good.  He won two clay tournaments, in Barcelona and Rome, but his year hinged on the epic semi-final he played with Djokovic at Roland Garros.  It was perhaps the finest match I’ve seen in terms of quality of tennis.  The second and third sets, in particular, were tennis at its best… long, breath-taking, gruelling rallies filled with impossible shots and impossible gets.  It was a feast.  Ultimately Djokovic prevailed, and went on to a near Grand Slam, and the loser was basically finished for the year.  I still make Nadal the favourite for the French this year.  It took a Herculean effort and the finest tennis to beat him.  Djokovic will not always be able to produce that, and no other player likely can.  If he’s in reasonable form, Nadal could grab another US Open title as well, where he has four wins from five finals.  Interestingly, Nadal has played five finals at each of the Australian, Wimbledon, and US Open.  He’s won once in Australia, twice at Wimbledon, and four times at the US.

 

Carlos Alcaraz – Only 18 years old, Alcaraz was very impressive in claiming the 250 in Umag as well as the Next Gen Finals.  He began the year ranked about #140, but strong play everywhere saw him ascend to #20 in the 12-month rankings, #32 in the frozen rankings.  His most significant win was likely over #3 Tsitispas at the US Open, a fifth set tiebreak epic that propelled Alcaraz to the quarters and his biggest point haul of the year.  He has only 97 points to defend before April, so after the Aus Open, Indian Wells, and Miami, he could be significantly higher, approaching the top ten, perhaps.  He is well ahead of my ranking-by-age curves for the path to become a multi-slam winning, yearend #1 during his career.  The only man to meet that metric but defy the result in the last 25 years has been Alexander Zverev, and it’s still possible that he will get there.  Alcaraz has shown proclivity for both clay and hard, and there is too little data to say anything of his potential grass court prowess.  It may yet be a year or two before he rises to the very top, but the trends are encouraging.

 

Roger Federer – had a very tough year.  All told he’s played just 19 matches in the last two years.  He left Wimbledon injured after a slip and underwent another knee surgery.  He’s skipping the Australian and says even Wimbledon may be in doubt.  It looks like we can expect little of him this year.

 

Other notable performances

Cameron Norrie had a breakout year that saw the 26-year old climb from relative obscurity to #12.  He made six finals, winning the Los Cabos 250, and shockingly, the Indian Wells 1000 in October.  It was an upset-ridden draw and the highest ranked player he played was 15^th ranked Diego Schwartzman, but it was still a superlative effort.

Aslan Karatsev stunned the tennis world by winning into the semis of the Aus Open as a qualifier.  He touched the #9 ranking (12-month rankings) in March after winning the 500 in Dubai, and for good measure won the 250 in Moscow in fall.

 

Yearend Top Ten

Like last year, this year I follow the 12 month rolling rankings in recognizing the top ten performers of the year.  It seems only fair to me that yearend rankings should consider only the previous year, and not older results, like the frozen official rankings.  That said, the official rankings have nearly caught up to the 12-month rankings.  Let’s hope by the end of 2022, this nonsense will have ended.

 

12-month ranking	Player	Official (frozen) ranking	My prediction one year ago
1	Djokovic	1	1
2	DMedvedev	2	4
3	AZverev	3	5
4	Tsitsipas	4	6
5	Rublev	5	8
6	Berrettini	7	22
7	CaRuud	8	23
8	Hurkacz	9	>30
9	Sinner	10	9
10	Nadal	6	2

 

I managed to successfully predict seven top-tenner’s for 2021, the other three predicted were Thiem, Federer, and Raonic. Hurkacz caught me totally by surprise and did not feature in my top-30 predictions last year.  New to the top group this year are Ruud, Hurkacz, and Sinner.  Only three of this year’s top ten have a slam title to their credit, same as the last two years.

 

Predictions for 2022

In picking a top ten for 2022, the first question is who will be #1?  The default choice would be Djokovic, #1 the last two years, and for seven years overall.  But the wolves are at the door.  With Djokovic focusing on the slams, he leaves a lot of points on the table for others to grab.  Medvedev is close to the #1 ranking and excels on hard courts – the most common tour surface. But with a slam under his belt, I wonder if he will be as hungry as he was in 2021.  He showed good energy at the end of the year in the ATP Finals and the Davis Cup.  But I think a hungrier wolf may take the form of Zverev.  It’s quite risky to pick someone title-less at slams with the history of mental yips that Zverev has, but the basic soundness of his game and the focused hunger he displayed in the last half of 2021 has me making the foolish choice:  Zverev at #1, Djokovic at 2, and Medvedev at 3.  They are the new big three of the moment.

Number four probably comes down to Tsitsipas or Nadal.  If Nadal can play a full, healthy year, he can threaten for #1, but the odds of that seem low.  His fate may lie with Roland Garros, if he can manufacture a 14^th French title, he may ride a wave of confidence to other deep runs, maybe even a US Open title.  And though he remains the favourite in Paris, he looks far from invincible.  Based purely on the limited schedule I expect Nadal to play, I think it more likely that Tsitsipas, who peaks often enough to maintain a high ranking, will claim that #4 spot, with Nadal defaulting into fifth.

At #6 I’ll take another gamble on Jannik Sinner and hope that he continues to improve.  It’s his serve that has been holding him back, his groundstrokes are solid and his attitude is effective.  He showed signs at the end of the year that the serve is getting better.  That, plus more maturity should see him improve.  He may even go higher.

At #7 I place his countryman, Matteo Berrettini.  It’s boom time for Italian tennis and Berrettini has been leading the way for the new generation.  His serve, and overall power, combine with good consistency into a formidable package.

For #8 I bet on another unproven young talent, Carlos Alcaraz.  Alcaraz showed some strong results in 2021, but has a way to go to become top ten.  All the parts of his game there.  He played an entertaining match with Sinner toward year’s end that will be the first of hopefully many in their rivalry.  Alcaraz won this first official encounter and looked the sounder and more deadly player in doing it.  It may take Carlos some time to develop the tools to play at that level consistently, but I think top ten is within reach.  And like the teenage champs of previous generations, you never know when a teen will surprise with a slam title.

Casper Ruud likely deserves to be in my prediction for 2022.  He showed marvellous consistency and poise in 2021.  That means only one spot remains in my predicted top ten.  In my imagination, this leads to a choice between Hurkacz, Rublev, or a returning Thiem.  Perhaps Tiafoe, who was peaking at the end of 2021 deserves consideration as well. 

Rublev has been top 6 in the 12-month yearend rankings the last two years so would seem an obvious choice.  However his dip in form at the end of 2022 has me looking elsewhere.  Thiem certainly has the talent to be much higher than #10, maybe #2 or 3.  But I’m not yet convinced his comeback will materialize.  Tiafoe is too unproven and streaky for me, so I will settle on Hurkacz for the #10 spot.  He proved he can rise to some big occasions in 2021, and should have enough opportunity to continue doing that in 2022.

 

Predicted top ten for 2022

	Player
1	AZverev
2	Djokovic
3	DMedvedev
4	Tsitsipas
5	Nadal
6	Sinner
7	Berrettini
8	Alcaraz
9	CaRuud
10	Hurkacz

 

For #s 11 to 20 I’ll start with Rublev, Thiem, and Tiafoe, and continue with Karatsev, Cilic, Auger-Aliassime, Fritz, Shapovalov, Schwartzman, and Khachanov.  It may seem ridiculous to go so far as to predict a top 30, but why break with tradition?  For 21 to 30 I name Federer, Murray, Carreno-Busta, Harris, Monfils, Isner, Brooksby, MacDonald, SKorda, and Opelka.

 

Slam Predictions

Australian Open

Djokovic has typically won when playing down-under.  He would be my obvious choice, if he actually plays.  Uncertainty over his vaccine status still has not been resolved.  In his absence I would pick Zverev, followed by Medvedev, and of course Nadal can never be discounted.  It would be a second career slam for Nadal if he can triumph down under.  For the quarters my picks are Tsitsipas, Berrettini, and the young guns Alcaraz and Sinner.  The bookies have Djokovic, Medvedev, AZverev, and Nadal in that order.

 

Roland Garros

With 13 titles, Nadal is still the favourite at the French.  The massive effort taken to overcome him in 2021 will not be easy to replicate.  The man most likely to do that, Djokovic, is my second pick, followed by last year’s runner-up, Tsitsipas.  Zverev rounds out my top four for what is, by match-winning percentage, his strongest slam.  Spots five to eight I think likely to fall to Alcaraz, Berrettini, Sinner, and Mevedev.  Thiem would feature in my prognostications but I won’t trust his comeback until I see it.  The bookies have Nadal, Djokovic, Tsitsipas, and Thiem.

 

Wimbledon

At Wimbledon Djokovic is the three-time defending champion, and in the absence of a healthy Federer, should be a class above the field.  Berrettini is a predictable choice to repeat as runner-up.  For the semis I’ll go with Medevedev and Zverev, and for the quarters, Nadal, Tsitsipas, Hurkacz, and Federer – presuming he’s healthy and just coming back.  The bookies’ top four for Wimbledon are Djokovic, Berrettini, Tsitsipas, and Nadal.

 

US Open

Medvedev has been in two USO finals so gets my top pick for New York.  Djokovic can’t be ignored but inexplicably struggles in the final round, winning only 3 times from 9 finals.  For the semis I’ll take Zverev and Nadal, and for the quarters, Berrettini, Tsitsipas, Alcaraz, and Rublev who, because of three second-week appearances there, just pips Sinner in my estimation.  The bookies have Djokovic, Medvedev, Nadal, and Thiem as their top four.

 

In Summary…

Djokovic had a year for the ages in 2021.  Medvedev proved himself with a slam title, and the #1 ranking is within grasp at some point during the year.  Zverev appears on the cusp of greatness.  I expect these three to dominate 2022.  I’d say it’s about 50-50 if Nadal joins them at the top – he has the talent, will his health allow it?  Beyond that, I’ll look for serious steps up from Alacaraz and Sinner.  The end result will probably be far different that I predict, and that’s what makes it fun!