Auger Aliassime-Lehecka, Fritz-Rublev. The men’s semi-finals of the Masters 1000 in Madrid, one of the 14 most important tournaments of the season, force organizers and professionals to reflect: where have the “big names” gone? Is a final weekend of an event without Djokovic, Sinner, Alcaraz or Medvedev attractive for the public (mind you: not for the niche, but for the general public)? The answer is, of course, no. If the discussion on the causes of the “death” of the top 4 were limited to simple competition and the skill of the so-called outsiders we would be here talking about Djokovic’s zero titles in 2024. Or Medvedev’s allergy to clay. But the Serbian’s pre-Madrid withdrawal, the withdrawals (precautionary or otherwise) of the Russian and our Jannik and the pain of the young Alcaraz (who missed Monte Carlo and Barcelona and will not be in Rome) shift the attention to a fundamental aspect for a tennis player, even more so if in the running for the most coveted positions in the ranking: the calendar. 36 ATP 250, 14 ATP 500, 9 Masters 1000 (will the tenth arrive in Saudi Arabia from 2027?) and 4 Slams to which are added ATP Finals, qualifiers, groups and finals of the Davis Cup, United Cup and this year also the Olympics . From the beginning of January to the end of November you end up in a meat grinder with very few weeks of rest (to be included when traveling from one tournament to another). A tour de force that inevitably leads the best athletes in the world to consider a Masters 1000 as “training” or to present themselves at the press conference as the No. 2 seed and title holder confessing “I will be happy if I manage to win 3/4 games” . There is something wrong.
