STEFANOS TSITSIPAS

Nationality:

Greece

Height:

193cm

Age:

Points:

2990

RANKING
#11

Player history

Born to a Greek father and a Russian mother, Stefanos Tsitsipas began playing tennis at the age of three and was initially followed by his mother Julija Salinikova, former WTA top 200 and former No. 1 in the junior world rankings as well as daughter of Soviet soccer player Sergej Salinikov, gold medalist at the 1956 Olympic Games.

Stefanos Tsitsipas had as a childhood idol Roger Federer, who inspired him for some game skills. He was later trained by his father Apostolos, a former tennis player who abandoned his job to coach him even among professionals. The three younger brothers Petros also play tennis, who often supports him in doubles tournaments, Pavlos and Elisavet. He nearly drowned in Crete aged 18 and was rescued by his father, and following this experience he said he felt no fear on the pitch. Passionate about music, in 2021 he published some songs he produced on the Soundcloud platform.

Tsitsipas' parents started playing tennis with their eldest son at an early age. Stefanos said: "My earliest memory is being three years old and hitting balls with my dad in between lessons. I remember watching the games on TV, as a kid, I can't tell you who was playing, but I remember to have looked."

He also participated in other sports as a child, including soccer and swimming. His father said Stefanos made the decision to become a tennis player himself, recalling that his son woke up in the middle of the night after a tournament in France at the age of nine and said to him: "Dad, I have to tell you one thing: I want to become a tennis player, I like the competition, I like the challenge." Tsitsipas started taking lessons at the Glyfada Tennis Club near Athens at the age of six and continued to train there. His father has always been her main coach and she formally studied tennis coaching at the University of Athens to help coach his sons.

In 2015, Tsitsipas also began training at the Patrick Mouratoglou academy, splitting his time between France and Greece during this time. His parents worked as tennis instructors at the Astir Palace Resort Hotel in Vouliagmeni at the time of his birth. They had originally met at a WTA tournament in Athens where his mother was competing and his father was a line judge. Stefanos has three younger siblings: two brothers Petros and Pavlos and a sister Elisavet who is the youngest. All of his brothers are also tennis players.

Career

Considered the best Greek tennis player ever, Tsitsipas has won nine ATP titles, among which the 2019 ATP Finals and the 2021 and 2022 editions of the Monte Carlo Master 1000 stand out. His best ATP ranking was third place on August 9, 2021, a record for Greek men's tennis. He reached the final at Roland Garros in 2021, thanks to which he became the Greek tennis player of both genders to have obtained the best result in a Grand Slam event at professional level. He was also the youngest tennis player to have beaten four top ten players consecutively in the same tournament (Rogers Cup 2018) since 1990, the year of the establishment of the ATP Tour, a record later surpassed by Holger Rune.

Making her ITF Junior Circuit debut in 2013, she won her first Grade 4 doubles title in August and a Grade 5 singles title in September. December 2014, he was defeated by Stefan Kozlov after eliminating Taylor Fritz and Andrej Rublev. In 2015 he came out in the quarterfinals of the junior singles tournament at the Australian Open and in the semifinals of the junior doubles at the US Open. At the end of the year he lost again in the final at the Orange Bowl, this time against Miomir Kecmanovic.

He made his debut in the main draw of a Challenger circuit tournament in February 2015 by passing the qualifiers at the Burnie International and was eliminated in the first round. The first victory in the Challenger circuit comes in the following October at the Mohammedia Open, where he passes the qualifications, in the first round he concedes only one game to Taha Tifnouti and is immediately defeated in the decisive set tie-break by Rubén Ramírez Hidalgo.

In May 2015 he lifted his first professional trophy at the Futures Greece F6 doubles tournament and went on to win two more Futures doubles tournaments later in the season. In November, he lost his first Futures final in singles at Greece F9 and that same month he won his first specialty title at Cyprus F1, where he defeated German Alexandre Folie in three sets in the final. In April 2016 he won his second Futures title in singles at Italy F6 and won two in doubles in Greece. The following month he reached three consecutive finals in singles on the ITF circuit, winning the first two at Italy F10 and Italy F12 and the streak of 14 consecutive victories ended with a defeat in the final at Futures Austria F2.

He wins another Futures in singles and one in doubles in the period in which he ends his career among the juniors. In October he played his first Challenger finals in Morocco and lost both, the first in three sets in Mohammedia against Gerald Melzer and in the second he collected only 4 games against Maxime Janvier in Casablanca. He then made his first experience on the major circuit at the Basel qualifiers, won his first fight with Rajeev Ram and was then eliminated by Robin Haase. With these results, on 31 October he climbed to 200th position in the world rankings. At the Genoa 2017 tournament, Tsitsipas won his only career Challenger title, did not drop any sets in the whole tournament and defeated Guillermo García López in the final; he thus gains 41 positions in the ranking and rises to 120th. At the ATP of Metz he passes the qualifications and in the first round he loses in straight sets to Benoit Paire.

He then participates for the first time in the Asian swing starting from the ATP 250 in Chengdu where he passes the qualifications and is again defeated in the first round. He suffered the same fate at the ATP 500 in Tokyo, where world No. 5 Marin Cilic inflicted his eighth defeat in as many ATP matches played. He also passes the qualifications in Shanghai and, in his debut in a tournament of this level, achieves his first success in the major circuit by defeating the No. 40 in the world ranking Karen Chacanov. He] is then beaten after two tiebreakers by John Isner.

He passes the qualifications to the next ATP 250 tournament in Antwerp and eliminates Pablo Cuevas in the first round; he accessed the quarterfinals thanks to the withdrawal of Ivo Karlović and achieved his first victory against a top 10 by defeating world No. 10 David Goffin in the tie-break of the decisive set. His first ATP semifinal saw him succumb to Diego Schwartzman in two games. With this result he entered the top 100 for the first time, and after the final loss against Corentin Moutet at the next Brest Challenger he climbed to 87th position in the ATP rankings.

In October 2018, he won his first ATP title on indoor hard courts in Stockholm, losing the only set of the whole tournament in the first round against John Millman, then eliminating Philipp Kohlschreiber and Fabio Fognini in the semifinals. With his victory over Ernests Gulbis in the final with a score of 6-4, 6-4, he becomes the first Greek player to win an ATP title in the Open Era. In Basel, he reached the quarterfinals with successes over Jeremy Chardy and Peter Gojowczyk, and lost for the third time out of three matches against Daniil Medvedev. At the Paris Masters he was defeated in the opening round by Damir Dzumhur.

He closes the season at the Next Generation ATP Finals and reaches the semifinal thanks to victories over Frances Tiafoe, Jaume Munar and Liam Caruana. He enters the final by overcoming Andrey Rublev in five sets and in the final act he triumphs over Alex De Minaur in four sets. He achieves the best result since the beginning of his career in a Grand Slam by reaching the final at the following Australian Open 2019. He qualifies for the first time at the ATP Finals and overcomes the round-robin with successes in two sets over Medvedev and Zverev. After the irrelevant defeat suffered against Nadal, in the semifinal he overtook Federer with a score of 6-3, 6-4 and won the most prestigious trophy since the beginning of his career by beating Dominic Thiem in the final with a score of 6-7, 6-2 , 7-6. In the first round of the 2020 French Open, he comes back two partials against Jaume Munar and prevails in the fifth set. With successes over Cuevas, Aljaz Bedene (who retires) and Grigor Dimitrov, he reached the quarterfinals in Paris for the first time.

In Monte Carlo 2021 he won the first tournament in the Masters 1000 category by defeating Aslan Karatsev, Cristian Garín, Alejandro Davidovich Fokina and Daniel Evans in that order without losing any set, and in the final he prevailed over Andrej Rublev with a double 6-3, result with which rises to first place in the ATP Race. After the victories at the Roland Garros over Jeremy Chardy, Pedro Martínez, John Isner and Pablo Carreño Busta, he eliminated the world No. 2 Daniil Medvedev in the quarterfinals and reached his first Grand Slam final by defeating Alexander Zverev in the decisive part, after making a comeback the advantage of two sets.

In the match that assigns the title he faces Djokovic again, fresh from the feat against Rafael Nadal in the semifinals and hunting for the second title at the Parisian Slam; Tsitsipas wins the first two sets and is defeated in comeback with the score of 7-6, 6-2, 3-6, 2-6, 4-6. At the end of the tournament he brings the best ranking to fourth position in the world, but gives Djokovic first place in the Race. In April 2022 he triumphed for the second consecutive time at the Masters 1000 in Montecarlo, in the semifinals he eliminated world No. 3 Alexander Zverev and in the final he defeated the surprise of the tournament Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in straight sets.

Currently he has reached the final of the Australian Open 2023. At the Australian Open 2023, Stefanos Tsitsipas fought not only for the possibility of reaching the final to play for the final victory, but also for the position in the ranking as in case of victory in the tournament the Greek would overtake Carlos Alcaraz and become the new number 1 in the world. There is curiosity about his possible performance in the final against the Serbian, especially after the 2021 final at the Roland Garros where Tsitsipas was two sets ahead but suffered yet another comeback from the Serbian champion. At the end, Novak Djokovic beat Tsitsipas, to win his 10th AO title.

Style of play

Tsitsipas is an attacking player who doesn't wait for the opponent, but is constantly looking for the point. His favorite surface is grass and Wimbledon is his favorite tournament. He has a good one-handed backhand and doesn't mind volleying, also favored by his stature. The forehand is solid and powerful, as is the first serve. It is above all with the forehand that the court opens up, preferring the inside out, a shot that allows him to often hit the net.

His favorite shot is the one-handed backhand, a rarity in modern tennis. However, his forehand is still the strongest swing of him. In his youth he experimented with both the one-handed and two-handed backhands, but chose to use the former at around age eight because both his parents and his idol Roger Federer all use a one-handed backhand, and also because he seemed more natural.

His favorite shot is the backhand down the line. Her forehand is especially useful for finishing points on first serve, as combined with her big serve, she uses her high topspin rate to pull opponents off the court for winners or hit the net more often than typical players from the baseline. He has difficulty returning serves against players with strong backhand kick serves, a weakness he has worked to improve through the use of blocked and cut backhand returns.

Rivalries

Tsitsipas has a rivalry with Daniil Medvedev and Alexander Zverev. Zverev said in 2019 that Medvedev and Tsitsipas have a bit of a strange relationship."
Tsitsipas once called Medvedev's style of play boring, but later took it up again, saying, "He plays extremely intelligently and surpasses you." Their relationship has thawed over time and improved somewhat, after they were teammates at the 2021 Laver Cup. Medvedev has since said of Tsitsipas: "I think we respect each other as players, but probably not so much on a level." personal. We don't have any kind of relationship, I would say."

Daniil Medvedev and Stefanos Tsitsipas have met 11 times since 2018, with Medvedev leading the rivalry, 7–4. They are considered two of the best tennis players of their generation. According to the BBC: 'The pair have had a thorny relationship for a long time and, while there is respect and warmth, there is always an element of drama when they meet.' Medvedev has won his first five matches against Tsitsipas, but Tsitsipas has won four of his last six.

Private life

Tsitsipas can speak English, Greek and Russian. He is a supporter of Greek soccer club AEK Athens. Tsitsipas' hobbies include vlogging. He hosts his own YouTube channel where he posts videos of his travels. He was in a relationship with New York-based research analyst Theodora Petalas from 2019 to 2022. Teodora Patalas was born in Greece and currently resides in London. Currently, Patalas serves as a junior strategist for a branding and marketing agency. The pair reportedly met through friends in New York City.

At the Australian Open 2023, Tsitsipas made an incredible proposition to the beautiful Australian actress Margot Robbie. The tennis player Greco said: "I like so many things about Australia and Margot Robbie is my favorite actress. I would love to see her here some day." A particular and quite sudden request, words that have intrigued the public and insiders. Margot Robbie is one of the most famous actresses in the world, well known in Hollywood. She is 32 years old and older than Stefanos but the Greek has made this curious proposal/request. Now we'll see if the actress known for films like The Wolf of Wall Street, Suicide Squad or Harley Queen.

Tsitsipas credits his mother's twin sister, who was also a professional tennis player in the Soviet Union, with helping the family's finances so that he could afford to travel with his father to train and compete during his junior career. His maternal grandfather, Sergei Salnikov, was an Olympic gold medal-winning member of the Soviet national football team and former head coach of FC Spartak Moscow. During a Futures tournament in Crete, Tsitsipas nearly drowned while swimming in the sea on an off day. After a current carried him from shore, his father noticed what had happened and helped save his life. He attributes her self-confident approach of feeling utterly fearless on the court to the perspective he has gained from this experience.

Net Worth and Endorsement

Tsitsipas' net worth is $20 million in 2023. The tennis player has collectively earned $20,525,795 in prize money from his professional career. At the moment, he ranks 26th on the all-time earnings list of professional tennis players. In the 2022 season, he earned over $4.2 million by winning 46 games and 2 titles. The Greek tennis player is an Adidas-sponsored athlete. He has an apparel related sponsorship deal with the international brand. Also, he has racket sponsorship with Wilson. His sponsorship list includes New Balance, Rolex and Rexona.