Casper Ruud is in Estoril where he is hoping to get his season on the right track as the previous months were quite disappointing.
Ruud had big plans in 2023 yet none of them has come true so far due to his tennis being lacklustre. He's only 5-6 on the year without any big results. He's not made the quarter-finals in any of the events that he played so far and that's been disappointing. He recognised that ahead of the Estoril Open which will be his first event back on clay.
My season is not naturally going as I would like. If that was because of my second pre-season in February and the fact that I played all those exhibitions with Nadal, I can’t say for sure. We will never know.
Ruud opened the subject about his 'preseason' on his own and elaborated further on it providing more context. Many raised an eyebrow when he explained his plan of not having an offseason but rather having one after the Australian Open. It didn't work and he admitted that he won't be doing that again in the future.
I don’t think I’ll do what I did in 2022 again in 2023 but it hasn’t been easy to manage my schedule because I’ve been playing the ATP Finals and then the United Cup, it starts too soon for me. It’s less than a month (between those events) and I can’t miss that competition (United Cup). My other teammates depend on me and if I don’t go, they can’t play.
The hope is to have a good week in Estoril and then build upon that in the coming weeks on clay. It's his favourite surface and best one so the hope is that things will finally click.
I hope to have a good tournament and good weeks on clay. It wasn’t the ideal start to the year, so I have to level up if I want to stay where I am in the rankings. I hope this tournament is part of the success.
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