Novak Djokovic’s admiration of fellow legend Pete Sampras is well documented. Maxime Cressy, who will play Djokovic on Tuesday at the Rolex Paris Masters, not only looked up to Sampras, but is a disciple of the American’s serve-and-volley style.

“I wanted to study [serve-and-volley] patterns, what made them successful, and Pete Sampras was the one player I watched the most since he was one of the most recent serve and volleyers,” Cressy told ATPTour.com. “I watched a lot of tapes from him and studied his game a lot. I was completely inspired by his way of playing.”

The American began focussing on serve and volleying aged 14, spending countless hours closely analysing his countryman’s serve. Cressy spent the most time watching videos of Sampras serving against Andre Agassi.

“He was hitting a lot of T serves and was having a lot of easy putaway volleys or easy second shots after the ball bounced after hitting T serves. I noticed that would be extremely valuable for my game,” said Cressy, who played college tennis at UCLA. “One tip that one of the assistant coaches at UCLA from when I was there, Grant Chen, gave me [is] that Pete Sampras’ biggest quality was to be unpredictable on the serve. I really took a lot of inspiration from that, a lot of admiration and I started to really analyse how he was making his serve unpredictable.”

Cressy discovered that the key is the service toss. It should not be a surprise whose toss he studied.

“Based on watching Pete’s serve motion and his toss, my main goal was to have the same exact toss for every single serve I would hit, whether it be a slice serve, a flat serve or a kick serve,” Cressy said. “The opponent does not know which kind of spin I’m going to put on my serve and what spot I’m going to choose.

“The serve I believe is the most difficult shot to master in today’s game and in the game of tennis and it’s also the one shot you practise the most when you’re alone. It was hours and hours of training on my own, with baskets of balls to really get that toss perfectly aligned. It’s about repetition and faith that it would work.”

It has worked so far. When Cressy arrived at UCLA, he struggled to make the lineup and would spend a bulk of his time on the team’s lower practice courts. Now he is one of the most dangerous players on the ATP Tour.

Stella Sampras Webster, the head coach for UCLA’s women’s tennis team and Pete’s sister, has been impressed by Cressy’s rise.

“[It’s] incredible because he came in to UCLA and he barely made the lineup. He definitely had some things he needed to work on,” Sampras Webster said. “But he really figured out his gamestyle and really found his identity. Once he did that, he just exploded. It was really neat to see him come through so well from where he was.”

Although she has not spoken to her brother about Cressy’s ascent, Sampras Webster added that ‘Pistol Pete’ still has an appreciation for serve and volley.

“I’m sure he watches it and I think he appreciates it because he knows how tough it is,” Sampras Webster said. “I think he likes the idea of having some serve and volleyers especially because there just aren’t very many.

“There are so many great grinders out there and that’s just one style to really counter those grinders. Being able to come forward and win points up at the nets just doesn’t give those grinders as much time.”

Cressy claimed his first ATP Tour title earlier this year at the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, where another recent serve-and-volleying star, Todd Martin, is the outgoing CEO.

“Maxime reminds me a lot of how I played. [He] serve and volleys, [is] willing to take risks, understanding that he’s not somebody out there who is meant to hit forehands from the left alley and just pin somebody,” Martin said. “He’s got to be different and it appears as those he really embraces being different.”

According to Martin, Cressy has “a pretty cool toolkit”. Serve and volleying is not a style seen often today’s game, but it has set the American apart.

“I would rather be Cressy than somebody who plays an awful lot like [Carlos] Alcaraz,” Martin said. “I don’t imagine many guys out there are going to be better than Alcaraz at that style of play.”

Andrey Rublev strengthened his Nitto ATP Finals chances on Tuesday when he downed big-serving American John Isner 6-2, 6-3 to reach the third round at the Rolex Paris Masters.

The 25-year-old produced a strong returning performance against Isner, breaking three times and winning 83 per cent (10/12) of points on the American’s second service to advance after 62 minutes. With his 49th victory of the season, Rublev has improved to 1-3 in his ATP Head2Head series against Isner.

“It is a really important win at this moment when I am fighting for Turin,” Rublev said. “I think I was a bit lucky. It was his first tournament since his bad injury. From the baseline I was feeling really confident. As soon as I was returning and the ball was in play, I felt I had an advantage and wasn’t nervous.”

Rublev is currently seventh in the Pepperstone ATP Live Race To Turin with 3,530 points. He is in the final qualification spot for the prestigious year-end event, to be held from 13-20 November.

Rublev’s closest challenger, Taylor Fritz, is in eighth, holding 2,955 points. The American, who defeated Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in his opening match, will next play Gilles Simon.

Ninth-placed Pole Hubert Hurkacz can also still qualify. The 25-year-old, who has 2,870 points, will face Frenchman Adrian Mannarino in the first round later on Tuesday. If Hurkacz can advance and then defeat either Holger Rune or Stan Wawrinka, he would face Rublev in the third round in Paris.

Rafael Nadal, Carlos Alcaraz, Casper Ruud, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Novak Djokovic and Daniil Medvedev have already qualified for the Nitto ATP Finals, with two spots left in the final week of the regular season.

Thanasi Kokkinakis and Nick Kyrgios have qualified for the Nitto ATP Finals, to be played in Turin from 13-20 November.

The Australians are guaranteed a spot under the Grand Slam champion provision, under which if there is a current-year major-winning team positioned between eighth and 20th in the Pepperstone ATP Doubles Team Rankings after the Rolex Paris Masters, that team qualifies for Turin in eighth.

Since Kokkinakis and Kyrgios are ensured of a Top 20 finish and Wimbledon champions Matthew Ebden and Max Purcell cannot catch them, they will compete at the year-end championships, joining Wesley Koolhof/Neal Skupski, Rajeev Ram/Joe Salisbury, Marcelo Arevalo/Jean-Julien Rojer and Nikola Mektic/Mate Pavic in the field.

Kokkinakis and Kyrgios made a splash at the beginning of the season when they went on a dream run to the Australian Open title. The home favourites quickly rallied the Melbourne crowd to their side, defeating a lineup of top veteran teams, including Mektic and Pavic, before lifting the trophy with a victory against Ebden and Purcell.

The duo played seven tournaments together this year, tallying an 18-5 record. The Australians also lifted the trophy in Atlanta and made the semi-finals in Miami and Tokyo.

Three places remain at the season finale, with fifth-placed Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos currently next in line to qualify.

Gilles Simon wrote another stirring chapter into his storied career Monday when he edged former World No. 1 Andy Murray 4-6, 7-5, 6-3 to reach the second round at the Rolex Paris Masters.

Competing in his final tour-level event, the Frenchman refused to go down without a fight in an entertaining clash. The 37-year-old rallied from 3-5 in the second set, lighting up Paris with his grit and quality to level the match, sparking scenes of joy among the home supporters.

Simon then kept his focus and outlasted the Scot in the longer exchanges in the third set to earn the 503rd win of his 20-year career. With his two-hour, 52-minute victory, the wild card improved to 3-16 in his ATP Head2Head series against Murray and will next face Taylor Fritz.

“It was a crazy match,” Simon said. “I was behind the whole match… At 3-4 in the second set I felt a lot of emotions coming. It was difficult to play my service game at that moment and he broke me. He got tight at 5-3 and this time I managed to push, hold my serve and break him again. I tried to push on every game.

“It was really difficult physically, but it was difficult physically on his side. But I thought ‘Come on, I have a chance to beat him.’ It is not like I have the best record against Andy. I really wanted to win this one and I was really happy I was able to do it.”

The American Fritz is currently eighth in the Pepperstone ATP Live Race To Turin, but will need a deep run in Paris if he is to qualify for the Nitto ATP Finals, to be held from 13-20 November.

Simon is making his 17th appearance at the final ATP Masters 1000 event of the season, with his best result being a run to the semi-finals in 2012. The former World No. 6, who has won 14 ATP Tour titles, will hang up his racquet following the event.

Murray has fond memories in Paris, having reached the final in 2015 before lifting the trophy in 2016. The 35-year-old claimed the No. 1 spot in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings following his title run in Paris six years ago. However, after a strong start, he was unable to cross the finishing line against Simon, misfiring in the crucial moments.

Kevin Krawietz and Andreas Mies are back to winning ways at the Rolex Paris Masters.

The German pair dug deep to hold off home favourites Adrian Mannarino and Fabrice Martin and clinch a 6-4, 7-6(5) victory on Monday at the ATP Masters 1000 event in France. The six-time tour-level titlists saved six of seven break points they faced to notch their first win at Paris-Bercy since they reached the semi-finals on tournament debut in 2019.

Krawietz and Mies are two-time Grand Slam champions, having lifted the trophy at Roland Garros in 2019 and 2020, and the pair is chasing its first ATP Masters 1000 crown in the French capital this week. However, they face a tough second-round assignment in Paris in fifth seeds Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos.

Also on Monday, home wild card pairing Sadio Doumbia and Fabien Reboul saved two match points in the Match Tie-break before clinching a thrilling 7-5, 6-7(4), 15-13 win against Hugo Nys and Jan Zielinski. Doumbia and Reboul’s reward for holding their nerve to clinch an epic two-hour, 10-minute battle is a second-round meeting with top seeds Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury.

Sander Gille and Joran Vliegen also advanced to the second round by defeating Sebastian Baez and Albert Ramos-Vinolas 6-4, 6-4. The Belgian duo will continue its bid for its sixth tour-level title against the in-form Ivan Dodig and Austin Krajicek.

The eighth-seeded Dodig and Krajieck are on an eight-match unbeaten run after triumphing in Naples and Basel in the past two weeks and are currently eighth in the Pepperstone ATP Live Doubles Rankings as they look to qualify for November’s Nitto ATP Finals.

It has been an unforgettable season for Carlos Alcaraz full of historic moments. One of them was when the Spaniard became the youngest World No. 1 in the history of the Pepperstone ATP Rankings.

On Monday evening at the Rolex Paris Masters, ATP Chairman Andrea Gaudenzi presented Alcaraz with the ATP No. 1 trophy presented by Pepperstone.

“For me it’s a dream come true being No. 1 in the world, to be a Grand Slam champion,” Alcaraz told the ATP Tour. “I feel like the No. 1, to have this trophy, it means a lot to me. “

Alcaraz is one of 28 players who have reached World No. 1 in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings. He accomplished the feat after claiming his first major crown at the US Open.

“Everything has come so fast. I didn’t think at the beginning of the year that I’m going to have the year that I’m having right now,” Alcaraz said. “I always believe in my team and in my work, so this is something that came with the hard work that I put in every day, the hard preseason, the work during the year with my team. Everything pays off.”

The teen is the top seed this week in Paris, where he will play Japanese lefty Yoshihito Nishioka in the second round. Alcaraz is now looking to become the youngest year-end World No. 1 in history with that award to be presented at the Nitto ATP Finals, where he will make his debut.

Australian Rinky Hijikata and Croatia’s Borna Gojo cruised to victory to claim their maiden ATP Challenger Tour titles this week. Hijikata dropped just one set all week to win on home soil in Playford, Australia, while Gojo was unbroken at the Ortisei Challenger. Gojo and Hijikata are among five Challenger champions this week.

#NextGenATP Hijikata took down Japan’s Rio Noguchi 6-1 6-1 in Sunday’s final to win the City of Playford International.

“I’m stoked [to win the title], I’m over the moon,” Hijikata said. “It’s a little bit of a relief, it’s always nice to win the first title, it’s not easy to get over that hump. To be able to do that this week at home, I’m pretty proud of the way I played this week.

“I came out firing. I thought I stuck to my game plan well. I played to the [windy] conditions as well as I could.”

Hijikata, 21, made his Challenger Tour main-draw debut at the 2018 Playford Challenger and this week, the fifth seed collected the title to become the youngest Australian to win a Challenger title since 2018, when the-then 19-year-old Alexei Popyrin won in Jinan, China. The title in Australia lifts Hijikata to a career-high No. 159 in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings.

Hijikata, who played college tennis at University of North Carolina from 2020-21, earned All-American honours as a sophomore before turning pro.

In August, the Sydney native claimed his first Tour-level win at the ATP 250 event in Los Cabos, Mexico, where he advanced through qualifying and defeated wild card Pacheco Mendez before falling to then-World No. 1 Daniil Medvedev. At the US Open, Hijikata made his Grand Slam main-draw debut and pushed Rafael Nadal to four sets in the opening round.

Gojo, 24, went on a run ousting four of the top-seven seeds at the indoor hard court event in Ortisei, Italy, including defeating seventh seed Lukas Klein in the final 7-6(4), 6-3 to win the Sparkasse Challenger Val Gardena.

Borna Gojo in action at the 2022 Ortisei Challenger. Credit: P.Codeluppi/ChallengerOrtisei

“This is big for me,” Gojo said. “I’m happy I was able to put together a nice tournament here and win my first Challenger.”

“It’s [The surface] a bit faster than usual, which is great for my serve, it helps me get some free points.”

The Split native, a former college standout, finished runner-up at 2018 NCAA Division I Tennis Championships (l. Chrysochos) and was named a three-time All-American at Wake Forest University. In 2018, Gojo helped Wake Forest earn the NCAA team title. Following his victory in Ortisei, Gojo climbs to a career-high 148.

At the Lima Challenger, Daniel Altmaier was crowned champion to win his second Challenger title this season. The German escaped Argentine Tomas Martin Etcheverry 6-1, 6-7(4), 6-4 in the final.

Daniel Altmaier celebrates winning a point at the Lima Challenger. Credit: @igmachallengers

Altmaier, 24, needed deciding sets in four out of his five matches in Lima to triumph and ousted top seed Federico Coria in the semi-finals. After claiming the Heilbronn Challenger in May, Altmaier climbed to a career-high 53. The title in Peru is Altmaier’s fifth Challenger title.

Gregoire Barrere won the all-French final in Brest, defeating 18-year-old Luca Van Assche 6-3, 6-3 to win the Open Brest-Credit Agricole.

“It was a great week for me,” Barrere said. “I had a level of play that increased as the week went on. Once I won my first round match here, it was all or nothing.”

Gregoire Barrere in action at the 2022 Brest Challenger. Credit: Un Oeil Averty

Barrere, seeded third, dropped just one set en route to claiming his fifth Challenger title. The 28-year-old is a five-time Challenger finalist this season, including in Orleans, where he won his first Challenger title (d. Halys) of 2022. The Frenchman rises to No. 93, marking a return to the Top 100 for the first time since August 2020.

Van Assche, who rises to a career-high No. 208, also reached the final at the Lisbon Challenger in September and qualified for the ATP 250 event in Antwerp, Belgium (l. Nishioka).

Tennys Sandgren advanced through qualifying en route to winning the Las Vegas Tennis Open, where he defeated countryman Stefan Kozlov 7-5, 6-3 in the final.

“This win means a lot to me as it’s been a tough couple of years,” Sandgren said. “This is the first time I’ve done a trophy speech in quite some time. I got lucky. We could be in the third set by now, roles reversed.”

Tennys Sandgren is crowned champion at the 2022 Las Vegas Challenger. Credit: Steve Krahn

The title on home soil is Sandgren’s first Challenger title since May 2017 (Savannah). In January 2019, Sandgren won his maiden Tour-level title in Auckland (d. Norrie) and climbed to a career-high 41.

Kozlov, who had defeated Sandgren in five of their previous six meetings across all levels, held five set points in the opening set, but was unable to convert them. The 24-year-old was competing in his first Challenger final this season.

Novak Djokovic will begin his quest for a record-extending seventh Rolex Paris Masters title Tuesday when he faces Maxime Cressy in the second round in the French capital.

The sixth-seeded Serbian has performed strongly at the final ATP Masters 1000 event of the season throughout his career, lifting the trophy in his previous two appearances in 2019 and 2021. Djokovic will face the American Cressy for the first time on Court Central and heads into the clash high in confidence.

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The former World No. 1 has won his past nine matches, lifting trophies in Tel Aviv and Astana in October. Djokovic, who will compete at the Nitto ATP Finals in November, will be looking to win a record-extending 39th Masters 1000 crown this week, having won his 38th title at this level in Rome in May.

“I feel great in this tournament,” Djokovic said in his pre-tournament press conference. “[I’ve had] lots of success. [It] always helps to come into the tournament confident and with some good memories, good emotions on the court. [The] past few times that I played here, I won both tournaments… Hopefully I can continue that run.”

Another upset from day 1⃣ in Paris

This one featured Cressy serving 🚀’s‼️

Serve Quality tour avg. 7.5/10#ShotQuality is calculated in real-time by analysing each shot’s speed, spin, depth, width, and the impact it has on the opponent#TennisInsights | @RolexPMasters https://t.co/tfroCqRtQi pic.twitter.com/zo9ceM8Z8k

— Tennis Insights (@tennis_insights) October 31, 2022

Andrey Rublev will look to boost his Nitto ATP Finals qualification chances when he plays John Isner in the second round in the opening match on Court Central. The 25-year-old is currently seventh in the Pepperstone ATP Live Race To Turin with 3,450 points.

Rublev, who occupies the final qualification spot, is 495 points ahead of eighth-placed American Taylor Fritz, who defeated Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in his opening match on Monday. Rublev’s task will be far from easy, though, with big-serving American Isner leading their ATP Head2Head series 3-0.

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Hubert Hurkacz will be ready to pounce if Rublev slips up, with the Pole taking on French wild card Adrian Mannarino in the first round. Hurkacz, currently on 2,870 points, is ninth in the Race.

The 25-year-old, who holds a 1-1 ATP Head2Head series record against Mannarino, made his debut in Turin last year. He will need a deep run in Paris if he is to return to the prestigious end-of-year event, to be held from 13-20 November.

In other action, third-seeded Norwegian Casper Ruud will take on French wild card Richard Gasquet, while #NextGenATP Dane Holger Rune plays Swiss star Stan Wawrinka. Earlier this season, Ruud reached the final in Miami before he advanced to Grand Slam championship matches at Roland Garros and the US Open.

Marc-Andrea Huesler did not hold back on his ATP Masters main draw debut on Monday afternoon. The Swiss qualifier delivered a high-quality first-round performance to take out 11th seed Jannik Sinner 6-2, 6-3 at the Rolex Paris Masters.

The 26-year-old Huesler lifted his maiden tour-level title on indoor hard courts in Sofia at the beginning of October but had gone 0-3 since. After defeating Hugo Gaston and Laslo Djere in qualifying in Paris, however, the lefty brought his big-serving, aggressive best to the clash against Sinner. He fired 20 winners, including six aces, to down the World No. 12 in 68 minutes.

“[It feels] really big,” said Huesler. “I’ve had a great season… I had two good matches in the qualies, I came out here and had nothing to lose today. That helped me play very aggressive. It was not his best match, for sure, but I had to be ready to take that [opportunity]. I just stayed at it, and I’m really happy with the win.”

First upset of the tournament 🚨

Swiss No.1 Marc-Andrea Huesler stuns No.11 seed Sinner 6-2 6-3 in the #RolexParisMasters R1! pic.twitter.com/X7YJQ7cdsX

— Tennis TV (@TennisTV) October 31, 2022

Huesler was the only player to win a set against eventual champion Felix Auger-Aliassime in Basel last week and the World No. 61 believes his level did not drop significantly despite his tough run of results post-Sofia. Having only broken the Top 100 of the Pepperstone ATP Rankings for the first time in July, he is now growing accustomed to performing on the biggest stages the ATP Tour has to offer.

“I think the experience these past weeks helped a lot,” said Huesler. “Last week I played a tough match against Felix [Auger-Aliassime] in Basel with a full crowd, which was full preparation for here. The centre court here is amazing, it was a lot of fun to play. I just tried to focus on the next point every time, got a bit lucky on some important points and made the right decisions in tight moments, and today I was better.”

Huesler’s second-round opponent in Paris will be Karen Khachanov. The 2018 champion needed little time on Monday to find his feet again in the French capital, where he raced to a 6-1, 6-1 first-round victory against Sebastian Baez. A challenging prospect for Huesler, but the Swiss admitted he was relishing the opportunity to take on another Top 20 star.

“Karen is a big server, for sure,” said Huesler. “I played against him once before in Davis Cup, lost in two sets there. Honestly every guy here is hard to beat, I’m thrilled to play against these guys. I’m here to do my best and I have a lot of confidence in my game. I’m sure the serve is going to be very important for both of us, so let’s see how it goes.”