Tennys Sandgren is “super pumped” that he will feature in the main draw of Grand Slam for the first time after the American commanded the USTA French Open Wild Card challenge. The American that earns the most Emirates ATP Rankings points over a four-week clay-court stretch is awarded a wild card into the main draw of Roland Garros. A runner-up finish at the ATP Challenger Tour event in Sarasota and title on Sunday in Savannah saw Sandgren emerge atop the standings.

“It’s really exciting, my first main draw of a Grand Slam,” stated Sandgren. “I’m super excited for the opportunity. Roland Garros is one of my favourite tournaments. I’ve only been once to play qualies, so to be in the main draw is fantastic.”

The 25 year old has attempted to qualify in a Grand Slam tournament 12 times, which has produced a 3-12 match record. “It’s been a lot of attempts, a lot of matches, a lot of Future events and ATP Challenger Tour matches to gain some confidence, to get my ranking up,” added the World No. 114. “To have a really good four weeks, to get this wild card means a lot.”

Hot Shot @TennysSandgren…. A familiar phrase at the @Sav_Challenger. Sandgren was at it again on Sunday.

Watch: https://t.co/fGVzi6EseJ pic.twitter.com/ghfGHOsNue

— ATP Challenger Tour (@ATPChallenger) May 8, 2017

The American will be a keen spectator of the Roland Garros draw later this month, but hopes a nine-time champion doesn’t fall next to his name. “It might be fun to play somebody big named. I’d love to avoid Rafa (Rafael Nadal), I don’t think I can win that match, as do a lot of tennis players,” quipped Sandgren. “It would be nice to have a ‘winnable’ match, somebody I can compete with and I feel like that is a lot of the guys. I’m going to compete as hard as I can on the court.”

Sandgren has been absorbed by watching past greats on TV at Roland Garros. “Rafa wins a lot! Some of the Guga (Gustavo Kuerten) matches were pretty special,” reflected Sandgren, referring to the Brazilian’s trio of titles in Paris. “He was one of my idols growing up and obviously he loved the dirt.

“The Gaudio-Coria 2004 final was a good one (Gaudio prevailed from two sets down). There were two when Rafa won the title without dropping a set, when he steam-rolled Federer in the final (2008) and then 2010, that’s just insane.”

Sandgren started his wild card journey to Paris by qualifying for his maiden ATP World Tour main draw in Houston (l. Escobedo in 1R) at the Fayez Sarofim & Co. US Men’s Clay Court Championship, followed by a run to the final (l. Tiafoe) at the $100,000 Challenger event in Sarasota.

“Playing Houston was awesome, it helped build up my confidence,” explained Sandgren. “It was good to start the clay court season with a couple of wins to get comfortable. I feel like I’ve improved a lot on the clay, it’s never been my favourite surface, but I feel like my fitness level is pretty high. I can stay out there for a while and grind out results.”

Sandgren’s progression was halted in early 2014 when a persistent left hip problem prompted surgery, before a five-month absence from competitive action. “It was sad, I was playing well,” said Sandgren, who had fallen to No. 714 in the Emirates ATP Rankings by February 2015. “It was a case of going back to the drawing board. I lost the first 15 matches I played after coming back from hip surgery, I lost 13 of them in three sets, so I just couldn’t catch a break.

“I kept at it, kept grinding. I finally got back into the top 200 at the end of last year and I have learnt a few lessons about looking after my body better and not training quite as hard. My main focus has been to protect my body, to make sure that I’m healthy when I’m on court.”

The three-time Challenger champion is ambitious for the remainder of 2017. “Tentatively I’m shooting for the Top 100, but I don’t really like performance based goals,” said the American. It’s more important for me how I’m competing, trying to stay calm, to then get the best out of myself and my game.

“I’ll keep working every day, looking at little things to improve in my game to help me get better. I think the ranking will come, whatever that will be, I’ll get the most out of my tennis.”

View FedEx ATP Head2Head for the following match-ups Monday at the Mutua Madrid Open & vote for who you think will win! 
Dimitrov v Kohlschreiber | Monfils v Simon | Kyrgios v Baghdatis

View Monday schedule and check back later for preview notes

Clay-Court Circuit Moves To Madrid: The fourth ATP World Tour Masters 1000 event of the year is in Madrid, where 19 of the Top 20 players in the Emirates ATP Rankings will descend on the Spanish capital. The Mutua Madrid Open has been staged on clay since 2009 and is held at the Caja Magica, with Spaniards winning the title five times since the inaugural edition 15 years ago. Four-time champion Rafael Nadal leads the home charge and is joined by fellow former winners Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray. Murray is the top seed, with Djokovic seeded second, Stan Wawrinka third and Nadal fourth.

10 THINGS TO KNOW IN MADRID
1) Big 4 Domination: Andy Murray, Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer have won 59 of the last 64 ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournaments, dating back to Nadal’s triumph at Monte-Carlo in 2010. The foursome has also accounted for nine straight titles at the Mutua Madrid Open since David Nalbandian defeated Federer in the 2007 final. Djokovic leads all players with 30 Masters 1000 titles, followed by Nadal (29), Federer (26), Andre Agassi (17) and Murray (14).

2) Andy Top Seed: Murray is the top seed in Madrid for the first time and comes in with a 15-5 record in 2017 (3-2 on clay). Last year, he was 13-4 with no titles entering Madrid. He went on to reach the Madrid final and end the season on a 65-5 run with an ATP World Tour-best nine titles.

3) Novak Reigning Champion: Djokovic, the defending champion, is looking to jump start his 2017 campaign. He enters with a 14-4 record and one title (Doha). One year ago, he came into Madrid with a 28-2 record and four titles. Djokovic lost before the final at the Australian Open, Acapulco, Indian Wells and Monte-Carlo, his longest drought without a final since 2010 (10 tournaments).

4) Nadal on a Roll: Nadal leads the ATP World Tour with 29 victories this season. He enters on a 10-match winning streak after capturing his 10th career title at ATP Masters 1000 events in Monte-Carlo and Barcelona. Nadal trails the Emirates ATP Race to London leader Federer by 310 points (4,045-3,735). If he reaches the semi-finals, the Spaniard will pass Federer for the most points in 2017.

5) Kyrgios Comes to Clay: Nick Kyrgios is 16-4 this season, but has yet to play on clay. The Aussie is 5-2 in Madrid and has posted Top 4 wins in each of his first two appearances, beating No. 4 Wawrinka en route to the 2016 quarter-finals and No. 2 Federer to reach the 2015 third round.

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6) Hometown Boys: Madrid natives Feliciano Lopez and Fernando Verdasco are playing at their hometown tournament for the 16th and 15th consecutive year, respectively. Six other players are appearing in Madrid for the 10th-or-more straight season: Nadal (15), David Ferrer (15), Wawrinka (11), Nicolas Almagro (11), Marcel Granollers (10) and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (10).

7) #NextGenATP Stars: There are five #NextGenATP stars making the trip to Madrid: Karen Khachanov, Alexander Zverev, qualifier Ernesto Escobedo and Lucky Losers Borna Coric and Jared Donaldson.

8) Milestone Watch: Three players are closing in on milestone wins: Ferrer (698), Tomas Berdych (596) and Gael Monfils (399). Marin Cilic reached 400 wins this past week in Istanbul.

9) Wild Cards: The Madrid wild cards are 2010 semi-finalist Almagro, 2004 quarter-finalist Tommy Robredo, Spanish veteran Guillermo Garcia-Lopez and Romanian Marius Copil.

10) Doubles Field: No. 2 seeds and 5-time champions Bob and Mike Bryan are without a title going into May for the first time in their careers. The defending champions are Jean-Julien Rojer and Horia Tecau. Overall, eight of the Top 10 in the Emirates ATP Doubles Team Rankings are in the draw.

Novak Djokovic enters this week’s Mutua Madrid Open in a situation unlike any he has experienced during the past decade. The defending champion arrives at the Spanish capital after having severed ties with his long-time team of coach Marian Vajda, fitness coach Gebhard Phil Gritsch and physiotherapist Miljan Amanovic.

But Djokovic, who announced the split on his website last week, said he’s excited about this new phase of his career and is energised by the challenge of returning to the top of the ATP World Tour.

“It was not an easy decision, neither for my team nor for me… This team has been there with me ever since I started a professional career. So it’s been 10 fantastic, successful years,” Djokovic said during his pre-tournament press conference. “But we all felt like we needed a change. We all felt like we needed to enter a new chapter. It was a mutual decision… We just accepted it in a very good way… We move on, excited, all of us to see what the next chapter of our career and life brings.”

Djokovic said the group discussed their future together at the end of last season and agreed to continue as a team in 2017. But after the Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters last month, where Djokovic fell in the quarter-finals, the group came to an agreement that it was time for a new start.

“We tried to work things out another time, but we just needed to move on. It was all in good spirits. I cannot be grateful enough to them for the sacrifice that they have made and the professionalism, the commitment, the friendship,” Djokovic said.

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The decision comes after what has been an up-and-down 10 months for the Serbian. Last June, Djokovic completed his career Grand Slam by winning Roland Garros. He became just the third player to hold all four major crowns at the same time, joining Don Budge (1938) and Rod Laver (1962 & ’69).

But since his Paris breakthrough, Djokovic has failed to live up to his previous historic level of play. During the second half of 2016, the Belgrade native captured just one title after Roland Garros, his 30^th ATP World Tour Masters 1000 crown in July at the Rogers Cup in Toronto (d. Nishikori).

He slipped to No. 2 in the Emirates ATP Rankings in November, and Andy Murray ascended to No. 1, where the Scot has remained. Following that uncharacteristic finish to the season, Djokovic made the first change to his team, splitting with Boris Becker, with whom he had been with since December 2013.

Now Djokovic’s team includes only a physiotherapist he’s been working with since October, his brother, Marko, and former Spanish tennis player Pepe Imaz, with whom Djokovic has worked with the past few years.

“In the last six months, I haven’t had too many great results. That’s why I’ve felt like I needed some changes and I needed to approach things a little bit differently,” Djokovic said. “I’m comfortable and excited and as motivated as ever, of course, to compete on a highest level and see where it takes me.”

Djokovic has positive memories to rely on in Madrid. The World No. 2 won the Masters 1000 tournament last year, beating Murray in the final, and in 2011, when Djokovic knocked off then-World No. 1 Rafael Nadal. The second-seeded Serbian will face a Spanish wild card in the second round, either Nicolas Almagro or Tommy Robredo.

“Life always throws new challenges at you. Instead of avoiding them and ducking them, I’m trying to confront them and trying to embrace them. In the process, I’m trying to get better as a person and as a tennis player,” Djokovic said. “How long this process is going to last before I get to the winning terms again, I don’t know. I’m just hoping I will get there again. That’s all I can say.”

Although Rafael Nadal has been garnering the most attention so far this clay-court season, World No. 1 Andy Murray expects to generate headlines of his own at the Mutua Madrid Open.

The top seed will open his campaign against a wild card in Guillermo Garcia-Lopez or Marius Copil. After defeating Rafael Nadal to win the 2015 Madrid title and finishing runner-up last year to Novak Djokovic, he believes the environment at La Caja Mágica offers everything he needs to have another big week at this event.

“It’s a great city, beautiful city. The venue is great for the fans. You have some really good courts. There’s lots of fans watching the practices,” said Murray. “We have a lot of space in the gym, good food. They put on a really good event for all of the players. They’re always improving things each year and do a very good job.”

After being limited to one match in six weeks due to a right elbow injury, Murray is rounding into form on clay. The World No. 1 suffered a third-round loss to Albert Ramos-Vinolas at the Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters, but avenged the loss one week later at the Barcelona Open Banc Sabadell en route to a semi-final finish. Following a week of rest and training at home, he feels even stronger heading into Madrid.

“Barcelona went really well for me. I got three matches in three days. I had the long, three-hour match with Albert Ramos-Vinolas on the Friday. I actually felt pretty good coming out to play again the next day and played some decent stuff there,” said Murray. “Practice here the last few days has been very good. I’m happy with how I’m playing. I’m starting to move better and feel like I served well the last few days, which is an important part of my game.

I served well last year and my results improved a lot because of that. Obviously haven’t served so well in Barcelona and Monte-Carlo,” he added. “It’s not easy at this level to win matches if you’re getting broken a lot. Hopefully I serve a bit better this week.”

Murray also acknowledged that second seed and defending champion Djokovic is in a similar situation returning from a right elbow injury. The Serbian surprised many fans by announcing he had split with his entire team, but the Brit said the decision was understandable.

“It’s difficult traveling with the same person or same people for 10, 11, 12 years. It’s very rare nowadays to see teams or coaching relationships last that long, just because of how intense it is. A lot of traveling, a lot of time away from families. You’re spending a lot of hours in the day together,” said Murray. “I haven’t to spoken to him about that, but maybe Novak just felt like it was time for a change.

“But rather than seeing it as a negative thing, it’s been obviously a very successful relationship he’s had with all of those guys. I’m sure they parted on very good terms,” said Murray. “We’ll see what Novak’s next moves are.”

For Murray, his next moves are solely centered around trying to win a second Madrid title. After an outstanding 2016 clay season that also included a title in Rome and runner-up finish at Roland Garros, he believes there’s no reason why those results can’t be matched or replicated.

“Expectations are high. I want to do well the next few weeks. In many ways, it’s the most important part of the year. There’s a lot of big tournaments that come very quickly, one after the other,” said Murray. “I’m motivated and looking forward to it.”