It's Time We Talk About Andrey Rublev...

[Applause] and then the [Applause] [Music] [Applause] punch this is Andre rublev chances are you have no idea what's going on in his head but one thing we know is that rublev hasn't been the same since that incident in Dubai he said he said I didn't didn't beyond the code violations meltdowns and obvious career sabotage lies a really likable player who is kind to everyone everyone but himself ruiv is becoming a really difficult player to watch at the moment however by taking a look at his recent issues playing style and common perceptions about him we can probably figure out what's really going on rublev was the best Junior player in the world in 2014 and his professional career got off to a flying start he broke into the top 50 won an ATP title and reached the quarterfinals of the US Open in 2017 at just 19 years old but unfortunately he suffered a devastating back injury which halted his development between 2018 and 2019 rublev dealt with injury and depression and even fell out of the top 100 all of this happened at a time when his peers csas meddev and Zev were having some of the biggest wins of their careers but unfortunately for rublev he was l lost and to worsen the situation the weight of expectation was crushing him we'll come back to talk about how this might still be affecting his career there were also rumors that rublev had a strained relationship with his mother who was practically involved in every single aspect of his professional tennis life but the Russian trashed those rumors and has said that he has a good relationship with his mother rublev managed to get back on track making quick inroads in 2020 with 5 ATP titles and 41 match wins he broke into the top 10 and has been a constant top 10 or even top five player ever since if you were to put the tag of consistency on any player rublev would be your guy I mean he's made countless deep runs at Majors and has many ATP titles to his name from 2020 when rublev became a top player up until now he's finished three seasons with at least 50 or more match wins and a 70% match win percentage The Only Exception being last year where he narrowly missed the cut with a 69.1% win percentage the reason for rublev's excellence and consistency is really quite simple his game is all around solid when it comes to the serve only five or six players have been more effective than rublev on their first serves in the last 50 2 weeks according to tennis insights data using the Continental grip he starts the toss from around the eye level with the weight on his back foot as he drives up and gets into the trophy position on the pinpoint serve rublev is able to coil over his legs and coupled with his great shoulder alignment the result is a clean beautiful and Powerful serve now he might not have the same zip on his serve as Sev Shelton sias or Heros to name a few but his accuracy is right up there with the best of them previously rui's second serve had actually been a liability but the Improvement has been insane in the last year rublev now ranks inside the top 10 in second serve points one in the last 52 weeks and don't even get me started on the bu forehand rublev's forehand potency per match has been the best on tour you wouldn't be wrong if you said that no one has had a better forehand than rublev in the past 52 weeks and my heart goes out to any opponent who gives rublev time to hit those monster forehand because they ain't coming back back might be the fastest forand of the week rublev's big servant forehand covered his deficiencies in other areas the relative lack of footwork and his average net game slowly but surely rublev began to improve those areas of weakness and although he had a disappointing end to last year he actually started 2024 on a good note that was until the incident in Dubai I studied rublev's last four losses because I wasn't sure if those losses were due to the Meltdown or other technical shortcomings rublev's game has obviously taken a down turn since the beginning of the sunshine double and he's been losing to players who he should have been crushing Yuri leka who was world number 32 in Indian Wells Thomas mahot who is number 60 in Miami Alexi poyin who was world number 46 in Monte Carlo and world number 87 Brandon Nakashima in Barcelona adding to the frustration all of those losses came in straight set with similar score lines a 64 score line in seven out of those eight sets to be exact the problem wasn't with his serve though although he lost rublev's serve statistics were impressive and in my opinion his overall performance wasn't as poor as the results might suggest however there was one thing I noticed the problem was with the return rublev won less than 25% of return points against both leka and mahash those numbers were a little bit better against papyan and Nakashima but the point I'm trying to make here is that rublev is is usually not one of the best returners in the world on the ATP leaderboard the return rating has him outside the top 35 now it goes without saying that with a very strong serve plus one you're likely going to have rublev on the ropes rublev won a measly 2 out of 27 first serve return points against lka and Indian wells in Miami he was able to win five out of 37 first serve return points against mahat the return got slightly better on clay for obvious reasons Monte Carlo was a much slower surface which gave him a bit more time to get into more rallies on the return still rublev was only able to win just eight out of 34 first serve return points against poyen for a top 10 player facing opponents ranked significantly lower than him rublev should have been more effective in his return games truth be told we should also remember that in those matches rublev faced players who had the Firepower to hit him off the court mahat leka papy Rin these guys bring a lot of Firepower to their game and for rublev only being average in Pace absorption for a top player ultimately meant that he just couldn't find a way past those guys I should also mention that rublev's backhand is the area that suffers more during these returns simply because it isn't the same type of offensive shot as his forehand but the truth is is that Andre's problems extend beyond his technical flaws mentally Andre rublev is no better than a child his actions are shameful and disrespectful that's a tough one casual fans who see rublev having a meltdown or throwing Tantrums like this might feel some kind of way to be honest when Nick curios of all people calls your actions crazy then you know you are way out of line um this is this is crazy I've I've never done that to be honest but personally I feel like there's more to it in an old interview done in Russian rublev once revealed that he grew up in a culture where kids were taught through yelling and beating this gives us a rough idea of what growing up on the tennis court was like for him I also want to point out that ruv suffered from depression early in his career up to the point where he stopped watching [Applause] tennis and now that he is a top player rublev holds himself to the highest standards when things don't go as planned he literally explodes most of the times when the things are not going my side when as soon as the one thing go wrong I start to show emotions and doesn't allow me to be on a better level yeah this is like next step for me if I want to improve and if I want to be on a better level this is the next step to to be a better player now let's tie everything together a tough childhood depression not to mention someone holding him to near impossible standards now I'm no psychologist but I know this isn't a great combo seeing rublev have a meltdown on court isn't funny I believe it should be taken seriously while we also try to not be too judgmental on him in my opinion rublev is aware that his self-sabotaging behavior is detrimental to his performance watching him play can be nerve-wracking as you never know when he might hit himself with his racket scream at himself cry or lash out at someone I also believe that rublev has some level of insight and self-awareness about his on court Behavior he often apologizes for actions off the court he's known as one of the kindest and most lovable guys on tour always entertaining fans with his acting and playful Antics but back to the problem I wouldn't go as far as saying rublev's actions are a call for help but I believe that he needs to be a lot more patient with himself and for us fans I believe we can have a lot more empathy and be a bit less judgmental when we see players having these meltdowns let me take you guys back to when rublev said this in the recent ATP undercover content it looks like a r no no no don't like him I don't like him at all I might be wrong here guys but I felt like rublev Loki meant it when he said he didn't like himself at all and that's where the problem lies I find it so heartbreaking that he hasn't been patient with himself because I thought this moment right here was going to change everything rev reign supreme in Monte Carlo some fans might argue that it's just frustration and not self-hate I'll leave that up to you guys I also feel like winning Monte Carlo could have done more to help rublev be a lot more kind to himself but here we are again like I've said before the life of a professional tennis player is not a walk in the park I also need to point out when we see players struggle emotionally and mentally it shouldn't be a subject of entertainment or something to laugh about however to go beyond just pointing out the problems let's try to offer some solutions what do you guys think the way out for rublev is here are some suggestions in my opinion does rublev need a break from tennis will it help or Not Another suggestion would be to get a mental coach therapist or psychologist But ultimately it comes down to rublev and his team to find a way out nobody can help you unless you're ready to help yourself also does the ATP need to take such emotional outbursts more seriously and by that I mean ATP finding more ways to help players that are going through one form of mental stress or the other should players be penalized for hurting themselves because it's quite weird that you get penalized for abusing your racket the ball or literally anything else but you don't get penalized for hurting yourself is a rule change the solution I don't think so and finally if it were up to you what healthy coping mechanisms would you suggest for Andre rubb to consider I might not have all the answers but one thing I know for sure is that watching players hurt themselves doesn't help our sport in a time where mental issues are being more openly recognized we need to let everyone know that such behaviors are not okay they don't pass the right message to Young fans looking up to these Players let's now move on to other narratives but before then you might have noticed that you guys didn't receive any emails this week that's because we're changing the format a little bit on our newsletter and most of the content that you've seen there is now going to be covered in our weekly Recaps we'll then be rolling out a brand new series for you guys which I'm sure you'll absolutely love rublev needs a new coach Fernando viente has done great work but it's time to move on to someone else for those who might have missed it rublev actually revamped his team last year he hired Fitness Coach Marcos porias as one of his new mentors and Spanish coach Alberto Martin has been helping rublev find the right emotional balance beo also studied psychology at the University of Barcelona and to be fair we were starting to see some progress before this recent slump I could welcome a coaching change in the near future but I feel like there are more important things to deal with at the moment the priority being the mental aspect rublev hit a wall at career high world number five he doesn't have another level to him first of all I hate to say this but I think rublev is a limited player technically and I don't mean any disrespect you definitely didn't hear me saying he has few tools F the few tools the few tools but the point I'm trying to make here is that sometimes it seems like there's no subtlety to his game rublev has one of the lowest net frequencies among top players and looking at the charted matches on tennis abstract you'll notice that rublev's net frequency is only around 7% which is the lowest compared to every other player in the top 30 I think he could add a lot more net approaches to his game and then looking at his drop shot frequency t abstract has it at. 3% again that's like the lowest you'll find among the elite players the point being rublev needs to employ more variation if he wants to beat other Elite opponents he needs to have a better backhand slice and many more options for better Point construction rublev's record against top players further highlights his struggles he only managed to secure his first wins against Alexander verev last year although some may argue that Zev was returning from injury meanwhile rublev's head-to-head records against other top players are also concerning 2- s against meddev 2-5 against cner who retired twice in those losses 1 and five against Novak jokovic and a loss to Carlos alcaraz in their sole encounter at the ATP finals in Turin last year on days when rublev's bu isn't getting him anywhere he should be able to think of nuanced ways to construct points without necessarily needing to crush the ball at every opportunity but let's also talk about rublev's results in Majors a little bit after his five- set win in Australia over Alex De Manor earlier this year rublev Advanced to his 10th career Grand Slam quarterfinal but then lost to Center in straight sets and having not made it past the quarterfinal stage the Russian has an 0 and10 record and is yet to reach his first major semi-final I feel pretty confident that he'll get on the board eventually but for now he seems to be the fifth man on a tour that always seems to have a big three or now big four we could say maybe he isn't even the fifth man anymore because he's now slipped down the ranking in his 10 quarterfinal losses in majors rublev has been the lower ranked player eight out of those 10 times he's lost twice to Novak jokovic once to rafan adal three times to Medvedev Stephano CTI pass once and then lost to CER this year the other two losses have been to Francis tifo at the 2022 US Open and Marin chich at the 2022 French Open I feel like rublev should have gotten away with a win at least one of those matches but that said I'm pretty sure he'll have many more opportunities in the coming slams because he's now made it to the quarterfinals of every slam that's got to account for something before Dubai rublev more often than not was beating everyone and then losing to those higher ranked players for the most part so I totally understand why everyone is worried now that he's losing to players he should be smacking correct me if I'm wrong but in the last 52 weeks I think rublev has scored only one upset he has beaten only one player ranked higher than him who was that player well it was Casper Roode in the 20123 bashad final in the same time frame rublev has lost to a total of 10 opponents ranked lower than him and the last of those four losses have been in succession so to address the narrative I think that for now I wouldn't bet on rublev to beat any top five player but that could change in the very near future as he continues to work on his game and as for his current losing streak well I don't see that lasting too much longer either the first step forward would be to get back his confidence on the court because I think it's really been gone for a while as the confidence Returns the results will eventually get better I mean they have to right one thing I love about rublev's game is the fact that he can perform at a high level on all surfaces hard quartz clay or grass and at 26 years old I don't think rublev has reached his Peak I still feel like he has another level in him and that he just needs the right key to unlock it for all the rublev fans out there those of you concerned about him and everyone else I really hope you enjoyed this video please hit that subscribe Button as we try to make it towards our goal of 100,000 subscribers by the end of the year and if you want to see deep Dives on any other player or coverage on any other topics from around the tours be sure to let me know in the comments and if you missed out on the grigor dimitrov analysis don't worry I have it showing on the screen right here for you to watch

Channel: Courtside Tennis

Views: 33,182

Keywords: tennis, roland garros, wimbledon, us open, australian open, tennis plus, courtside tennis, andrey rublev, andrey rublev analysis

Id: lqM8_-TIFjQ

Length: 16min 43sec (1003 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 28 2024