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2010 Wimbledon runner-up Tomas Berdych is praising Jiri Lehecka's work ethic and noted it is impressive how the 21-year-old takes care of the physical and fitness aspect of the game. Berdych, who was the face of Czech men's tennis for over a decade, is seeing very promising signs in Lehecka's game.
Lehecka, who just turned 21 in November, is currently ranked at No 47 in the world - which makes him the highest-ranked Czech male tennis player. “He’s very young. But what I’ve seen, it’s really the way he’s composed with his game.
I think it’s very good. What I like is his fitness preparation or his body being strong and some of the young kids, they might struggle with it. They need more muscles or lack power. That’s definitely not his case, which I like," Berdych told ATP Media.
Lehecka 'modeled' his game after Tomas Berdych
As a kid, Lehecka loved watching the great Roger Federer. But when the time came for Lehecka to model his game after someone, he picked Berdych. “Even he mentioned it many times, so it’s nice to hear for me when somebody took a bit of that inspiration.
It’s funny to hear, he was 10, 11 when we won the Davis Cup, so he was really [a] kid and we were doing really well. So you already start to see those differences in ages, but other than that, very good. I think he has a bright future ahead of him," Berdych said.
At the start of the 2023 season, Lehecka made his first big Grand Slam result as he made the Australian Open quarterfinal before losing to Stefanos Tsitsipas in three sets. In Melbourne, Lehecka clinched two very notable wins as he defeated Felix Auger-Aliassime and Cameron Norrie en route to reaching the last-8. It remains to be seen if Lehecka can continue his rise and make more strong results in the rest of the year.