NextGen Tennis Stars Struggle to Secure Grand Slam Victory: A Closer Look at the Opportunities Missed by Medvedev, Zverev, and Tsitsipas

Daniil Medvedev’s painful defeat in the Australian Open final against Jannik Sinner, the second in which the Russian wasted an initial two-set lead on the same stage (Rafa Nadal came back against him in 2022), highlights, once again, the failure in Grand Slams of the first NextGen tennis players, the category created for players under 21 years old (20 from 2024) in 2017. Among Medvedev, the oldest at 27, Alexander Zverev (25) and Stefanos Tsitsipas (26) have won only one, the one Daniil won at the 2021 US Open, against Novak Djokovic.

Furthermore, all three have lost finals in which they won by two sets to zero. Medvedev, on two occasions, both at the Australian Open, in 2022, against Rafa Nadal, and on Sunday, against Sinner. Tsitsipas let that good advantage slip away at Roland Garros 2021, against Djokovic. And Zverev had won the 2020 US Open title match, when Dominic Thiem came back.

Medvedev has been the best of them, with six finals in majors and victory in the 2020 ATP Finals, some Masters 1,000 and the 2021 Davis Cup. Tsitsipas was also a finalist in the 2023 Australian Open (defeat against Djokovic) and has won Masters and once the Finals (2019). Zverev won them twice (2018 and 2021) and was Olympic champion in Tokyo 2020. But in the Slams, the most prestigious tournaments, none take off. First, the Big Three (Federer, Nadal and Djokovic) cut them off and now it is the younger ones, like Sinner and Alcaraz, who are stopping them.

Other original NextGen, such as Andrey Rublev, Karen Khachanov, Denis Shapovalov, Frances Tiafoe, Alex de Miñaur, Taylor Fritz and Hubert Hurkacz, have had some success at Masters 1,000, but have not made it past the semi-finals, at best (Khachanov , Tiafoe, Hurkacz, Shapovalov), in Slams.

Difference between men and women

TENNIS | AUSTRALIAN OPEN

There is a curious fact that concerns these generations of players. Women born between 1989 and 2000 have won 25 Grand Slams: Kvitova (2), Azarenka (2), Muguruza (2), Ostapenko (1), Stephens (1), Wozniacki (1), Halep (2), Osaka ( 4), Barty (3), Andreescu (1), Kenin (1), Krejcikova (1), Rybakina (1), Sabalenka (2), Vondrousova (1). There are only two men in that same age range: Thiem (1) and Medvedev (1).

2024-01-29 10:52:38
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