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Jack Draper’s straight sets second-round victory against Tallon Griekspoor caught the eye - Getty Images/Julian Finney
Feeble Friday turned into Super Saturday as Britain’s three leading men all surged into the third round of the Madrid Open, thus reversing the unhappy results of the previous 24 hours.
Friday’s matches at the Caja Magica had seen Katie Boulter, Sonay Kartal and Emma Raducanu all depart the event, landing just a single set between them.
But Jacob Fearnley, Cameron Norrie and Jack Draper enjoyed better fortunes as they moved into the last 32 of this prestigious tournament. It is only the second time that there have been three British men in the third round of Madrid, with the previous instance coming in 2022.
Of the trio, Draper was the one whose form caught the eye. Having climbed to the lofty position of No 6 in the world, he is now the highest seed left in the bottom half of the draw, courtesy of Carlos Alcaraz’s withdrawal and Novak Djokovic’s defeat earlier in the day.
His performance more than justified the billing, as he squashed Tallon Griekspoor – a talented Dutchman ranked at No 34 – without showing the slightest sign of stress. The eventual 6-3, 6-4 scoreline failed to convey the one-sided feeling of the match. In 10 Draper service games, Griekspoor won a total of 12 points.
There was a moment in the middle of the match when Griekspoor turned to his coach with a baffled expression and said: “He’s not playing clay-court tennis!”
He was probably referring to the way that Draper was looking to finish points quickly by hammering his lefty forehand into the corners. Traditionally, clay rewards a more patient approach. But Madrid has always been something of an outlier on this front, because its 650m altitude means that the ball travels quickly through the thin air.
In the build-up to this match, Draper had told Sky Sports’s Karthi Gnanasegaram that he wanted to learn from the example of Rafael Nadal, and specifically the way that he used to run around his backhand to dominate with his lefty forehand.
That is exactly what Draper did here, in a match where he probably hit twice as many forehands as backhands. It takes agility and fast feet to favour one flank in this way, but then Draper has been training with his old friend Jannik Sinner – the world No1 who is on the verge of returning after a three-month doping ban – for much of the past week. All that sparring has clearly brought him to Madrid in confident mood.
After the match, Draper was asked about Griekspoor’s comment to his coach, and replied, “I’m not going to be as effective as I want to be if I’m defensive. If someone’s getting me on the run on these courts, that’s not easy for anyone. So I just tried to play aggressive, using my serve-volley, trying to look for my forehand. If it’s getting into his head then fair play.”
Earlier, both Fearnley and Norrie had fought back after unpromising starts against higher-ranked opposition. Fearnley scored the first top-20 win of his career when he upset 19th seed Tomas Machac by a 1-6, 6-3, 6-2 margin, while Norrie posted a 2-6, 6-4, 6-0 win over 26th seed Jiri Lehecka.
Djokovic enters ‘a new reality’
Looking beyond parochial British concerns, the biggest story of the day was a third-straight defeat for tennis legend Novak Djokovic, who was well off the pace in a 6-3, 6-4 loss to Italy’s Matteo Arnaldi.
The result means that Djokovic has not even won a set for almost a month, since he beat Grigor Dimitrov to reach the Miami Open final. Since then, he has lost in straight sets to Jakub Mensik, Alejandro Tabilo and now Arnaldi – three players ranked outside the world’s top 30.
After the match, Djokovic admitted that he was unsure whether he would play this tournament again. “I hope it’s not [the last time],” he said, “but it could be.”
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Tennis legend Novak Djokovic suffered his third-straight defeat - Reuters/Juan Medina
Asked about his expectations coming into Madrid, Djokovic replied: “Not big at all, to be honest. I was hoping I could play one more match than I played in Monte Carlo [where he went down to Tabilo on his first outing].
“Kind of a new reality for me, I have to say. Trying to win a match or two, not really thinking about getting far in the tournament. It’s a completely different feeling from what I had in 20-plus years of professional tennis, so it’s kind of a challenge for me mentally to really face these sensations on the court, going out early now regularly in the tournaments.
“But that’s, I guess, the circle of life and the career, eventually it was going to happen. Now I’m trying to use this as a driving force for the future. Obviously grand slams, I was saying many times, are the most important tournaments for me. Which doesn’t mean that I don’t want to win here, of course I wanted to, but grand slams are where I really want to play the best tennis. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do that in Roland Garros, but I’ll do my best.”
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