Holger Rune Looked Like He 'Tapped Out' At Roland Garros According To McEnroe

Monday, 02 June 2025 at 13:19

byErik Virostko

Holger Rune lost in the fourth round of this year's Roland Garros, and after the match, he also drew some criticism from John McEnroe.

Rune is one of the best players of the current generation. He is still only 22 years old, and among the players under 23, he is the second-highest-ranked player on the ATP Tour, just behind Carlos Alcaraz.

When it comes to players under 25, there are a few more players ranked ahead of the Dane, as Jannik Sinner, Jack Draper, and Lorenzo Musetti are all currently above Rune, who peaked at the World No. 4 position.

But a couple of years ago, it seemed that Rune would for a new "Big Three" with Sinner and Alcaraz, as they seemed to be far ahead of everyone. That didn't happen, even though Sinner and Alcaraz now have three and four Grand Slam titles, respectively.

John McEnroe, who works as an analyst for TNT Sports, looked at Rune's career after the Dane's fourth-round loss to Musetti in the fourth round of the 2025 Roland Garros.

"Holger was the guy that I thought would be the third guy with the new big three, Alcaraz, Sinner, I thought it’d be Rune. Rune got a lot to prove to try to get with the big boys. I remember when he played Ruud here a couple of years ago, he sort of brushed him off when he lost. Like, 'how could I lose to this guy?' And so it’s taken him a while to start to understand what it takes."

"But he’s learning that. He seems to be more settled. Got the old coach back. Mom still seems very involved. There’s a fair amount of families like that, but seems to be on the upswing again. I think that’s the reason he’s seeded 10 instead of seeded four, because concentration goes in and out."

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McEnroe also looked at the specific reasons why the young Dane hasn't yet reached the level of Alcaraz and Sinner. The former American player thinks that Rune still has work to do when it comes to his conditioning and mental approach to matches.

The former ATP World No. 1 thinks that Rune sometimes gives up too easily when he's in a losing position. At the same time, McEnroe also thinks that the Danish player is in a great position to join Alcaraz and Sinner as the third guy who could challenge for Grand Slams.

"It’s also conditioning. That happened to be the hottest or second-hottest day of the tournament. “He almost, to me, tapped out. He was this close to like it’s over, and he looked really negative. I mean, it was one of those days where it’s like a war of attrition."

"I think he’s, you know, again, he’s… I like where he’s headed, but he’s still got some work to do to close that gap. So, this would be, this is a huge match for these two guys to show like who’s got the mojo a little bit more, who can really press the Alcaraz, Sinners of the world."

"I mean, there’s, you got Alcaraz, you’ve got Sinner, then you got Novak. Dare I say, Rune is someone of a distant third in terms of who can win it. Then you’ve got these two, Zverev and I’d throw Tommy Paul into the mix. I’m not saying that he’s there yet, but it’s one of those five, six guys that’s gonna get their way up to three, four in the world soon, because there’s other guys dropping like flies."