Stefanos Tsitsipas

Stefanos Tsitsipas plays tennis professionally and as of February 28, 2022, he is ranked No.5 in the world by the ATP. His highest ATP ranking was No.3, which he first achieved in August 2021. This made him the highest-ranked Greek player in the history of the sport.

In 2019, he won the ATP Finals. He is one of the youngest players to have won that title. He has made it to the semi-finals of the Australian Open thrice.

Player Profile and Personal Life

Stefanos or Stef was born on August 12, 1988, in Athens, Greece. He currently splits his time between his home country and Monte Carlo in Monaco. Tsitsipas stands 193 cm and his last listed weight is 90 kg. A right-handed player, Tsitsipas has a powerful one-handed backhand.

He turned pro in 2016 and is coached by his father Apostolos Tsitsipas and Patrick Mouratoglou. He has also been coached by Thomas Enqvist.

His mother, Julia Apostoli, is a former tennis player who played in the WTA circuit. He started taking tennis lessons at age six but he was introduced to tennis earlier than that. He can speak English, Greek, and Russian. He is of Russian descent from his mother’s side of the family. His aunt also played tennis professionally.

Playing Style

Like many other top players, Tsitsipas is an aggressive baseliner and is an all-court player. He hits powerful groundstrokes, uses an eastern grip, and is known for the power of his forehand. He prefers the one-handed backhand because that is what his parents use.

Career

As a junior, Tsitsipas was ranked as World No.1 in 2016 following a stellar year where he made it to, at least, the quarter-finals of all the tournaments he joined. In addition to that, he also bagged the European Junior Championship juniors title. That year, he also won the doubles event at Wimbledon while partnered with Kenneth Raisma. He was the first male Greek junior to ever win a Grand Slam in the Open Era.

Early in his professional career, he played a number of low-level events on the ITF circuit, also joining Challenger tournaments. His breakthrough year was 2018. This was when he made it to the quarter-final of the Qatar Open. He later made it to the final of the Barcelona Open where he lost to then-World No.1, Rafael Nadal. After this, he broke into the Top 50.

Also in 2018, he won his first Grand Slam match at the French Open. Later, he also made it to the final of the Canadian Open. The ATP awarded him the Most Improved Player at the end of the year.

He continued to progress in 2019. He started by representing Greece in the Hopman Cup alongside Maria Sakkari. It ended in a three-way tie. This year, he also made it to the semi-final at Melbourne Park for the first time. He also won this year’s ATP Finals. In August he was ranked No.5. He ended the year ranked No.6 in the world.