Elite competition in tennis: Will Zverev achieve his second victory in the season finale?

Alexander Zverev against Casper Ruud – this duel reminds tennis fans of two special games at the French Open. Now the two will meet as opening winners in the season finale of the eight best tennis players of the year. In the evening (8.30 p.m./Sky), Zverev will be taking a potentially decisive step towards his goal of reaching the semi-finals at the end-of-year tournament in Turin, which is worth more than 15 million euros.

French Open defeat for Zverev 2023

In a direct comparison, Zverev is 3:2 ahead. Most recently, the 27-year-old from Hamburg and Ruud from Oslo, who is two years younger, met in the semi-finals of the French Open. Last June, Zverev ended his semi-final curse at the French Open against Ruud and reached the final in Paris for the first time at the fourth attempt. There he missed his coronation after the dramatic 3:6, 6:2, 7:5, 1:6, 2:6 defeat against Carlos Alcaraz.

A year earlier, the German number one had to accept an unexpectedly significant defeat against the Norwegian – handicapped by a thigh injury. The two-time French Open finalist Ruud is considered a clay court specialist, even though he has already defeated Zverev once on hard court: in the quarter-finals in Miami in 2022. Back then outside and not in the hall like now in Turin.

At the start of the ATP Finals, Ruud surprised with a two-set win against the Spanish tennis star Alcaraz, who was, however, ill.

Ruud admits: “I’m not full of self-confidence”

“I’m not full of self-confidence. I think that’s shown in the last few weeks,” said Ruud about the form with which he started the ATP Finals. It remains to be seen whether a win against Alcaraz can change that so quickly.

Zverev got off to a successful start with a two-set win against the Russian Andrej Rublev. After the match he even trained again.

On Tuesday he exceeded his allotted time during training, but also had to cough several times during training. The world number two has had lung problems for a long time; pneumonia was reported at the end of September.

At the Laver Cup in Berlin at the end of September, a detailed examination revealed that “25 percent” of his lungs were not functioning, Zverev said in Turin. Now he feels “okay,” he said. “That doesn’t mean that my lungs are at 100 percent, but I actually feel fit again now.”