Jack Draper has been without doubt one of the most improved players this season.
He began the season with an injury which forced him to miss the United Cup, and Draper also did not play the Dubai Tennis Championships.
Draper’s injuries and fitness levels were cause for concern prior to this season, but he has shown vast improvements in these areas and it has been reflected in his results.
Now he has reached a new level of play on clay and took Casper Ruud to the limit in Madrid Open final, and Draper looks to build on these results.
Casper Ruud names the two shots Jack Draper plays that he finds ‘scary’
Jack Draper and Ruud played one another for the first time in Sunday’s Madrid Open final. Ruud stole a tight first set from Draper before the British number responded to take the second and force a decider.
He broke through at 2-2 and Ruud stayed solid on serve to clinch a 7-5, 3-6, 6-4 victory and win the biggest title of his career so far.
Post-match Ruud reflected on his hard-fought win against Draper and expressed the two shots he is most impressed with in the World number five’s game.
“I think that he has very little or few holes, if any, in his game. Look, he’s a quite tall guy. He’s big, strong, and then he also moves great. He’s able to defend really well and also play aggressive,” Ruud said.
“He moves, like I said, great to be a fairly tall guy. And of course he has that lefty, tricky serve and also everything kind of gets opposite when you’re playing a lefty.
“But I was super impressed in particularly the first and second, or even the whole match, with how he handled my heavy forehand down to his backhand, which is something that I feel like it’s my weapon and my way of kind of damaging my opponent’s game.
“It’s probably my favorite shot, ripping a heavy forehand cross, and he’s just there, like, stepping in and countering, like, even faster sometimes and changing directions. So that’s something I was really impressed with.
“He only hit a few errors that came at a crucial time for him. But, yeah, you’re scared of his forehand because he rips it cross, rips it down the line. You’re also, in a way, scared of his backhand because he can rip and counter from that side as well.
“So there aren’t much holes in his game that I see or that I feel, especially here on clay, which is maybe his, I don’t know, but maybe his least favorite surface so far of his career. But he’s definitely got an incredible future on any surface now with the level he’s shown here in Madrid.”
Casper Ruud won the biggest title of his career at the Madrid Open
For all Ruud’s qualities, he struggled to deliver on the biggest stage.
Before his success in Madrid, the World number seven had never won a title at Grand Slam at Masters 1000 level, and he lost all his previous finals.
But that streak is now over and Ruud will go into the rest of the clay court season with plenty of confidence, especially after his title win propelled him back into the top 10.
“My record in big finals is still not good, it’s 1-6,” Ruud said. “I’ve been in many unbelievable and incredible positions in my career, and I’ve been able to experience some great things and, unfortunately, have been on the losing spectrum of many of those matches, but that’s okay.
“In many ways, my career has gone better than maybe I thought was possible sometimes. Of course I always dreamed about winning tournaments like this or Grand Slams or becoming World No. 1, and I’ve been fairly close.”
He added: “It feels great, of course. It’s been a long time coming. [This was] one of the really big goals I dreamed about when I was young, so it’s an incredible feeling to accomplish it. Also the way I did it today, it was a great match.”
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