The 2019 ATP Tour season had ended with the much-debated revamp of the 100+year-old tournament the Davis Cup. Oddly it was Barcelona footballer Gerard Pique that led the revolutionary change in format into a World Cup of Tennis event held across one week in Madrid.
It was the Spanish team that won on home soil with Rafael Nadal leading the way.
Serbia win inaugural ATP Cup
Seven weeks later the very first edition of rival world tennis event the ATP Cup took place in Australia. The national team competition with singles and doubles matches deciding round robin and then knockout ties, it was almost identical in format to the previously held Davis Cup.
This time it was Serbia who stood on top of the tennis world as Dusan Lajovic proved his worth with wins over Felix Auger-Aliassime and Karen Khachanov, while Novak Djokovic completed a formidable team and took care of Denis Shapovalov Daniil Medvedev and Rafael Nadal.
While all that was happening, the first ATP 250 tournament of the year was also taking place in Dohar, Qatar.
It was Andrey Rublev who lifted the trophy in Dohar, after he raced through the tournament without dropping a set. Losing finalist Corentin Moutet would also be delighted with his week’s work after coming through qualifiers to beat Milos Raonic and Stan Wawrinka on his way to the final.
Rising stars claim silverware
The Tour settled in Down Under with two 250 tournaments taking place side by side in Adelaide and Auckland as the players acclimatised to conditions ahead of the upcoming Australian Open.
In Auckland, top seed Fabio Fognini was dumped out in the first round by veteran Spaniard Feliciano Lopez, but it was young Frenchman Ugo Humbert who went all the way beating his countryman Benoit Paire in a third set tiebreak in the final.
Meanwhile, across the Tasman Sea Andrey Rublev continued his unbeaten start to 2020 by winning his second tournament in a row, beating Dan Evans and Felix Auger-Aliassime on his way to victory in Adelaide.
Djokovic unbeatable Down Under
The first Grand Slam of the year was won by Novak Djokovic after he came back from 2-1 down against Dominic Thiem in a brilliant final to lift his 8th Australian Open title.
As always, the fortnight under the Melbourne sun provided plenty of thrillers but interestingly, not many shocks as the bigger names all progressed about as far as their seedings suggested.
Federer made the semi-finals but only thanks to coming back from 8-4 down in a race to 10 points tiebreaker final set to home favourite John Millman in the third round, and then saving a shocking seven match points against Tennys Sandgren in the quarters before again coming through in five sets in what were two of the matches of the tournament.
First Grand Slam of the year to Djokovic.
Monfils delights adoring crowd
In early February, the Tour headed off in all directions for three ATP 250 tournaments held in Pune India, Montpellier France and Cordoba Argentina.
Players had a choice on which destination and surface they preferred, while most of the top ten used weeks like this on the tour to take a break.
Top seed Diego Schwartzman was beaten 2-1 in the final by third seed Christian Garin in Cordoba, in a tournament made up predominantly of South American and Spanish players, who typically prefer the clay court competitions.
In Pune, the top seed Benoit Paire was beaten by qualifier Roberto Marcora, while second seed Ricardas Berankis was beaten in the semis by tournament winner Jiri Vesely who won five of the ten sets it took to lift the title by a tiebreaker.
Home favourite and number one seed Gael Monfils delighted his adoring crowd by lifting the trophy in Montpellier. Canadian Vasek Pospisil beat Shapovalov and David Goffin on his way the final but couldn’t match the French showman on the day.
Casper Ruud’s first ATP title
The Tour stayed in Europe and South America but moved from Asia to USA as Rotterdam New York and Buenos Aires played host to the world’s top stars.
With Rotterdam being an ATP 500 event, most of the higher ranked players opted to compete there. Neither of the top two seeds Medvedev and Tsitsipas made it to the quarters and it was Gael Monfils who continued his winning ways to lift the title beating Auger-Aliassime in the final.
In New York, Kyle Edmund was the last man standing, beating Italian veteran Andreas Seppi in the final, with big serving favourites John Isner and Milos Raonic both losing their opening match.
Norwegian youngster Casper Ruud won the first ATP Tour level title of his career by beating several clay court veterans including Andujar, Lajovic and Londero on his way to victory in the Argentine capital.
Indoor, outdoor, clay or hard courts
Another week began with ATP tournaments taking place on indoor hardcourts in Europe, outdoor hardcourts in North and clay courts in South America. Rio de Janeiro 500, Marseille 250 and Delray Beach 250 were the points and trophies on offer.
Dominic Thiem made his first outing since being defeated in the Australian Open final and struggled through two three set matches before being beaten by qualifier Gianluca Mager, who made it all the way to the final of Rio de Janeiro, where he lost to Cristian Garin who picked up his second title of the season.
Gilles Simon and Alexander Bublik would both have been happy with their runs to the semi-finals in Marseille, but it was Stefanos Tsitsipas who bagged his first trophy of the season by handing Felix Auger-Aliassime his fifth consecutive defeat in the final of a tour level event. Although five final defeats is a poor record, reaching five finals by the age of 20 is a remarkable achievement for the Canadian.
Reilly Opelka served 19 aces compared to 16 from his semi-final opponent Milos Raonic, and then another 27 in the final against Yoshihito Nishioka to lift the trophy in Delray Beach.
Big guns back on court
The last week in February saw the return to play for Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal although they set off in opposite directions with Nadal competing in the Acapulco 500 and Djokovic heading to play in the Dubai 500. The clay-courters had the option to remain in South America and play in the Santiago 250.
Djokovic continued his unbeaten run in 2020 and added the Dubai 500 title to his Australian Open and ATP Cup wins. The world number one beat Tsitsipas 2-0 in the title match, having earlier seen off Khachanov and Monfils. Rublev, Gasquet and Evans all also had good runs to the latter stages of the tournament.
On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, talented players such as Wawrinka, Dimitrov, Zverev, Auger-Aliassime and others stood between Rafael Nadal and the Acapulco 500 title. Five straight set wins later, and Nadal was holding the trophy aloft, with American Taylor Fritz being the final obstacle to sweep aside.
Brazilian youngster Thiago Seyboth Wild was the surprise winner of the Santiago 250 beating second seed Casper Ruud 2-1 in the final.
Global lockdown
And that game on the first of March were the last competitive matches on the ATP Tour for the foreseeable future as the covid pandemic caused all sporting events and much more to shut down.
It wasn’t until July, after four months in lockdown, that the first few players and groups began to dip their toes cautiously back into competitive action.
Novak Djokovic’s ill-fated Adriatic Tour was not a success with several high profile players contracting the virus.
More lowkey events in the UK, France, Spain, America went off without too many problems but there was an extremely cautious mood amongst players, fans and tournament organisers as to exactly how a return to action would look.
It was the Billie Jean Tennis Centre in Flushing Meadows where the tour resumed, with the Western & Southern Open, usually played in Cincinatti, hosted there in the week prior to the US Open to limit unnecessary travel, but allow players to acclimatise and get some competitive action under their belts before the year’s second Grand Slam.
However, several big names such as Federer, Nadal, Wawrinka, Monfils, Fognini, Nishikori and Kyrgios chose to stay at home and not return to action in New York.
Back on court it was business as usual for Novak Djokovic as he picked up his third trophy in as many tournaments, coming back from set deficit in both the semis and final to beat Bautista Agut and Raonic respectively. Elsewhere Dominic Thiem was hammered 6-1 6-2 in little more than an hour by Felip Krajinovic in his first game back since lockdown.
US Open draw wide open
The following week it was the US Open and with Federer and Nadal absent, this was a great opportunity for Novak Djokovic to close the gap on his rivals in the career race for most Grand Slams. It was also a brilliant opportunity for all the rest of the top players to finally get their hands on one of the sport’s biggest prizes.
When Djokovic got disqualified from the tournament for accidentally striking a tennis ball in anger into the neck of a line judge, the last 16 suddenly had no players who had won a major title before.
It was Dominic Thiem who stepped out of the pack to claim his maiden Grand Slam title, after an epic comeback from 2 sets down against Alexander Zverev.
Second Grand Slam of the year to Thiem.
During week 2 of the US Open the European clay court swing got quietly underway with the Kitzbuhel 250. Made up mainly of players who had been knocked out early in New York, and some others who hadn’t even travelled, Kitzbuhel was won by Miomir Kecmanovic who beat Yannick Hanfmann in the final.
Rublev continues great season
The first ATP Masters 1000 took place in Rome as the tour began to regain some shape as the big players adjusted to the clay ahead of the rescheduled upcoming French Open. Novak Djokovic beat Diego Schwartzman 2-0 in the final but only after the Argentine had claimed his first victory in ten attempts over King of the Clay Nadal in the quarters.
Andrey Rublev continued his fine season with another ATP 500 title in Hamburg in the last tournament before Roland Garros. The Russian defeated Tsitsipas in the final. Ruud and Garin were the two beaten semi-finalists.
Rafa sends message to doubters
There was much talk that 12 time Roland Garros winner Rafa Nadal was under more pressure this year to defend his title than any other, with the slower conditions later in the year supposedly suiting his rivals Djokovic and Thiem.
That didn’t seem to bother him though, as he delivered a stunning performance in the final against Djokovic, winning 6-0 6-2 7-5.
Thiem already beaten by Schwartzman, in a tournament where youngsters Jannick Sinner and Hugo Gaston caught the eye with victories over Alexander Zverev and Stan Wawrinka respectively.
Third Grand Slam of the Year to Nadal.
Mid October signalled the last month of the ATP tour in 2020 so it was decision time for the players as to where to go to try and win points and when to rest.
Last dash in the race for London
St Petersburg 500 and Cologne 250 both offered indoor hardcourt conditions while the clay courters could head to play in the Sardinia 250.
Andrey Rublev came out on top in his native Russia with a 2-0 win over Borna Coric in the final, while Canadians Denis Shapovalov and Milos Raonic both had good weeks.
Alexander Zverev also won his home title in Germany beating another Canadian Felix Auger Aliassime 2-0 in the final. Spaniards Roberto Bautista Agut and Alejandro Davidovich Fokina were the two losing semi-finalists.
On the Sardinian clay, in the last clay court match of the season, Laslo Djere beat Marco Cecchinato to become the third Serbian player to win an ATP Tour level title in 2020 following his countrymen Djokovic and Kecmanovic.
Back-to-back titles for Zverev
The players could choose between competing in the Antwerp 250 or staying in Cologne where the same venue hosted back-to-back ATP 250 tournaments.
Alexander Zverev chose to stay put after winning the title in week one and he repeated the feat by comfortably defeating Diego Schwartzman in the final.
Over in Belgium in it was French star Ugo Humbert claiming his second title of the year with a strong tournament beating Pablo Carreno-Busta, Dan Evans and Alex de Minaur on this way to victory.
Sonego stuns Djokovic
Austria and Kazakhstan were the two destinations in the week before the final Masters 1000 tournament of the year. 500 points were on offer in Vienna and 250 available in Nur-Sultan.
Andrey Rublev was once again the player who outlasted all others, as the Russian won a fifth title of the year in Vienna beating Lorenzo Sonego in the final. That was only after the Italian delivered the biggest win of his career, and biggest shock of the ATP season, by hammering world number one Novak Djokovic 6-2 6-1 in the quarter finals.
Meanwhile Australian John Millman delivered a solid tournament to beat Verdasco, Paul, Tiafoe and Mannarino to claim the first tour level title of his career.
Rafael Nadal was the only member of the big three who took part in the year’s third and final Masters 1000 event. Ordinarily nine of the prestigious events would take place but due to the covid pandemic most were cancelled.
Daniil Medvedev was the eventual winner after a comeback win over Alexander Zverev in the final. Ugo Humbert beat Stefanos Tsitsipas 7-6 6-7 7-6 in one of the earlier matches of the tournament.
Medvedev win signals shift in power
The O2 Arena in London hosted the season ending ATP Finals for the final time before the tournament moves to Turin in 2021.
Andrey Rublev and Diego Schwartzman made their debuts at the event that was won by Russian star Daniil Medvedev, 11 years after his countryman Nikolay Davydenko won the event the first year it was hosted by London.
Thiem and Medvedev both beat Nadal and Djokovic on their way to the final, hinting at a shift in power at the top of men’s tennis for 2021.
